bearers. After contemplating the scene for some time, he pulled his mother by her dress, and looking up to her face, said earnestly:

"The child looked on again, evidently not comprehending why she should say 'Hush!' Another pull at the dress, another earnest look, and in a subdued tone, the childish voice asked:

"Mother, where are their blue noses?'

'Talking of children, reminds me of another childish anecdote, which I have lately heard in these New-England 'parts.' You no doubt know what a Yankee 'muster' was in the olden time. Well do I remember my boyish glee when my mother gave me 'nine-pence,' and I revelled in untold wealth and 'dreams of glory,' on 'Muster-Day.' The story is anent the youthful WEBSTERS. Their father had given them each a small sum, and they had been to the Militia 'Muster.' At night-fall, they returned home; DANIEL, as usual, somewhat ahead of his brother. Their father met them, and, addressing the first, said:

"Well, DAN, what have you done with your money?'

'Spent it!' was the sturdy reply.

''And what have you done with yours, ZEKE?'

"Lent it to DAN!''

'A LITTLE boy, blind from birth, aged about four years, died in this village a few days ago, with scarlatina. About an hour before the little sufferer departed, he exclaimed: "Pa! I see now! Darkness is all gone! Day is come!'

'His father inferred from the incident that he was better, and would probably reBut an hour passed, and he was with the angels.'

cover.

'LITTLE EDDY, on his way to school, frequently loitered by a small stream which he was obliged to pass, to witness the gambols of his play-mates while bathing; the water being of sufficient depth in some places for that purpose. Fearing some accident might efal him, his mother had told him never to venture near, and in strong terms, not to go into the water. One day, however, being overcome by temptation, and the urgent solicitations of boys older than himself, he yielded to their importunities and his own wishes; and for an hour entered into their aquatic sports right heartily. But as ill luck would have it, while dressing himself, by some mismanagement, he put on his little shirt wrong-side out, entirely unnoticed by him at the time: but the quick eye of his mother saw it, and divined the reason at once. Before retiring for the night, it was customary for the little boy to kneel by her side and repeat his little prayer. While on his knees, she took the opportunity to reprove him for disobeying her commands: EDMUND, how is it that the buttons are on the inside of your shirt-collar?'

"I don't know: is n't that the way, mother?'

"No, my son; you have disobeyed me, am sorry to see: you have been in swimming; else how could you have turned your shirt?'

The little boy felt that his mother had spoken the truth, and was for a moment silent. However, the satisfactory explanation, as he thought, soon occurred. With a triumphant look and bold voice, he replied:

Mother, I-I-guess I turned it gettin' over the fence!''

'You will allow me, although I am a bachelor, to say a word or two about a matter in which it might be suspected that I feel no special interest. But this suspicion would be altogether unfair, and is one which I will endeavor to remove, as soon as 'VENUS' and the next 'COMET' are 'in conjunction.'

'Your 'Gossip' about children is so welcome, even to me, that I glance at the table of contents as soon as I receive my KNICKERBOCKER, to see if I can find any more of it. And when found,' I linger over it, as when, plucking to pieces a rose, I carefully unroll the undeveloped petals, to mark and admire the pencilling of that Hand which 'paints the lily.' From my 'gossip' let me select for you some specimens of children's talk which I remember to have heard.

'Little JOHNNY was an excellent marksman; and, with a sportsman's pride, scorned to shoot at a bird sitting.' His younger brother, HARRY, accompanied him one day, to witness the skill of which he too, felt proud. JOHNNY brought down the birds on the wing,' much to his satisfaction; but when he was induced to try one or two 'sitting,' his success was not so complete. So, when they returned, HARRY, exulting in the skill of his brother, and sure of making his mother proud of him, hastened to her with the assurance that 'JOHNNY had learned to shoot birds 'on the wing' so well that he could hardly ever hit them when they were sitting still!'

'LITTLE MORRISON was early 'waked up' every morning; for, when hearing his father inquire, one night, if the moon were 'up,' he wished to know who waked it up?' And on another occasion, and with a similar suggestion, he puzzled his father by asking where the moon's bed was!

'A LITTLE fellow who was certainly disposed to examine subjects ab initio, asked his father, one day, 'who made God?' He was told that no body made GOD; that He always existed; that He made every thing else. The child went away with a thoughtful air, which indicated an endeavor to believe what he did not comprehend. But after a few days, he ran to his father with a sparkling face, saying: 'Father, I know now how it is: GoD's mother died when He was a baby, and He has forgotten who she was!'

'Does not every one live over his first again, in this his childish effort to determine what happened before 'in the beginning?''

'WILLIE's father is a clergyman, and 'temperate in all things:' so WILLIE had never seen a man chewing the 'vile weed' until he was about three years old, when Mr. —, holding his little son by his dimpled hand, stood in the street for a moment, to speak to an acquaintance. WILLIE was all eyes, as he could not comprehend the conversation; and seeing the heavily-bearded individual occasionally put a pinch of 'fine-cut' into his mouth, was considerably puzzled and astonished. At last, he could stand it no longer. 'Pa,' said he, anxiously, 'does that man chew hair, so as to make it grow out over his face?'

'ELLA'S mamma had allowed her to walk up and down before the door, with strict injunctions never to go alone off the walk into the street. This piece of flagging was her world, and she often looked with longing eyes beyond it. One day ELLA's babysister died, and ELLA talked with her mamma of the mystery of death. 'Where do you think baby is now?' Mrs. asked her little girl. 'Oh!' said ELLIE, 'I think her soul has gone right straight off the side-walk!'

'EDDY was up for exhibition one afternoon, and was being catechised before his admiring friends:

"Who was put into the fiery furnace?' asked his father.

"SHADRACH, MESHACH, and ABEDNEGO,' was the answer, after some assistance.

"Who put them in?'

'EDDY's face brightened this time, and with all the boldness of one who was sure that he was right, he cried out:

"Little JOHNNY GREEN!''

'I HEARD a story lately about the 'little-folk,' which will please E- and yourself, I am sure. A two-year old boy was taken by his mother, who lives hereabouts, to a church, for the first time. When the organ commenced playing, the youngster listened attentively for some time, and then, turning to his mother, asked in a loud voice: 'Ma! ma! where's the monkey?—I do n't see the monkey!''

'THERE were several persons in a house where there was a young child, some two or three days old; among them a little bright-eyed boy, of some four summers. When the grand-mother soon after came in, with the babe in her arms, he was particularly pleased with it, kissed it, and evinced every symptom of delight; asked his aunt where she got it, and was told she bought it of Dr. ADAMS: then asked how much she gave for it. She told him she paid ten dollars. He then stood by her lap, on which the child was lying asleep, his eyes beaming with intense satisfaction. The babe soon awoke, and squalled

vociferously. Instantly his countenance fell; and, with almost disgust pictured on his beautiful face, he turned around, and said: 'AUNTY, if I was you, I'd take it back to Dr. ADAMS, and get my ten dollars!-making such a noise as this!''

'As you permit little children to come to your editorial table, perhaps you may find room for the following. The little girl had been called in, one bright morning, to see for the first time that light-giving, semi-personage, the new baby. She had already learned, as children always learn promptly, that the baby had been 'bought;' and after wondering whether 'father,' who happened to be away from home, would approve of the purchase in his absence, asked her mother what the baby's name was to be. 'GRACE,' was the reply. 'Oh, yes!' said the little thing at once; 'I know:

GRACE will support our following years,

And keep our virtue strong."

'Now, for sweetness and aptness, and a vindication of the Sunday-school, I think the quotation a model.

'By-the-way, the same little girl, who had not been accustomed to grates, being once where there was a poker near the chimney-corner, very soon reasoned out the analogical use of it: to sharpen the shovel and tongs on'—a steel, you know.'

'Tall Corn from an Editor!'- Under this head, we find the ensuing paragraph in an editorial column of 'The Tribune' daily journal:

'WE received a few days since, sundry specimens of four-story Indian-corn, plump fourteen feet from root to tassel, from an editorial contemporary of many years, accompanied by this note:

'I SAW lately in The Tribune a paragraph speaking of some very tall corn that some body had sent to some editor some where. I send you some, therefore, of my own planting, hoeing, and raising. Is n't it some?'

It grew, with a great many specimens like it, on 'Old Knick. Place,' our temporary sojourn for the summer, here at Piermont; and I have had great pleasure in seeing it grow.

There was one stalk, with three ears, some two feet taller than any one I now send you; but one night there was a gale on the Tappaan-Zee; we heard the surf breaking in the night on the shore; and in the morning I looked for my preeminent stalk and 'lo! the wind had passed over it, and it was gone!' broken off mid-trunk.

I should have sent these stalks to the 'American Institute,' to hear with all their ears what might be going on there; but that association once threw out my Patent, Back-Action, SelfActing Hen-Persuader' - an invention which would have increased the amount of eggs 'brought per annum to tide-water' more than an hundred per cent. ; and I did not choose to submit the works of NATURE to the same institution; although I believe that our venerable ci-devant jeune homme, Mr. HENRY MEIGS, and our friend Professor MAPES, would have seen that justice was done me in the premises.''

Your Ancient Contemporary,

''Piermont, on the Hudson, September 12, 1853.''

'OLD KNICK.'

This corn lay for some weeks in the publication-office of 'The Tribune,' and attracted, as we hear, much attention. Think of that, brother-'farmers!' We confess to a 'beat,' however. The correspondent in Illinois, who when he came east 'left corn-stalks twenty-five feet high, with twelve ears a foot and a half in length on each, and on the top of every stalk a full-grown gourd-shell, with a pint and a half of shelled corn in it '— that man can take the white hat which we have just laid aside, for one more befitting the season! He has 'got us!' A METROPOLITAN correspondent ('R. H. S.' Park-Place) sends us the following. We remember to have heard the anecdote before, but it may be new to our readers: 'Old JOHN BALDWIN,' as he was familiarly called, one of the queerest fish found in any sea, was famous as a counsellor in courts of 'Justises of the Peas;' in other words, a 'pettifogger' in one of the south-western counties of this State. He was a shrewd observer, and knew the calibre and metal of their 'Honors of the Quorum' to a T. When he found his case hopeless, or the scales of justice

inclining to his adversary, he would sometimes come down' on the worthy SHALLOW with such a torrent of invective as would almost annihilate him, and furnish a rich treat for the crowd. One, more learned than usual, threatened that if he continued to abuse the court, he should commit him. He boldly defied the dispenser of the statutes, and avowed that he did not know enough to write a 'mittimus.' The magistrate proceeded at once with the laborious task of copying from 'EDWARDS' Treatise' the terrible instrument, and BALDWIN Continued pouring out the vials of his wrath upon the 'leatherheaded dignitary.' As the threatening document was about being completed with those terrible words, 'Hereof fail not at your peril,' BALDWIN deliberately picks up the ink-stand and dashes it up-side down upon the commitment, the contents of which, like the recording angel's tear, 'blotted it out for ever.' 'There,' says BALDWIN: 'I shall be out of the county before you can boil down oak-bark ink enough to write another!'-and before the astonished sage had recovered his sight, (for sundry drops of the murky shower had flown into his eyes,) the great expunger had mounted his horse, and escaped from 'the jurisdiction.' Now that 'the melancholy

days are come,' and Winter, with lingering step, comes stealing on, the following lines, 'Spring is Afar,' ('Der Lenz ist Fern,') rendered from the German of GUSTAV. PFARRIUS, by an accomplished correspondent, will be considered appropriate and timely:

'WHEN the forest is ready to go to the Dead,
He dons, as for bridal, his gaudiest wreath;
And in wedding-apparel of gold and of red,
Thus bravely he waiteth for Death.

'And the sun saunters out from the breast of a cloud,
To smile on his pomp-a smile sickly and dim:

For the Spring is afar: soon, the storm cometh loud,
To dance the death-dance with him.

'Then what wrestlings fierce, and what blusterings strong!
And each death-throe shakes showers of leaves from his head:
Soon a low voice of moaning awakes its sad song,

And the beautiful forest is dead!

H. C.

'SOME time since,' writes 'KARL BENEDICT,' (from whom we shall be pleased frequently to hear,) from a pleasant town in Ohio, which shall be nameless, 'Dr. STEVENSON, whom you may remember from a copy of one of his 'Tak nottis'-es sent you months ago, presented me with several pages of his life and trials, with the request that I should send the manuscript to you for publication. The paper will be too long for your use, if you felt disposed to use it, and I therefore have extracted brief paragraphs here and there, containing the pith of the contents. If it will suit any purpose, it is at your disposal. The thing is no fiction. Dr. STEVENSON is a fact, and so is his literature. He told me the other day, that the old notice of him did more good for him and for the cause of Christianity than any thing that ever happened. A powerful revival was the consequence, in which a pilot on the river, and an old retailer of oranges in the 'Diamond,' both 'hard cases,' had been 'brought under concern.' In giving this 'curtailed synopsis' of the DOCTOR's autobiography, we trust it is not necessary for us to say, that we are far from

sanctioning any disrespect of sacred things. But, in the words of the Rev. SYDNEY SMITH, we do not hesitate to rescue religious observances from the hands of a 'consecrated cobbler;' and in this, we believe, with him, that we are 'rendering a useful service to the cause of rational religion:

'You may bear in mind a morsel sent you some time since, duly served upon a leaf of your 'TABLE,' which was carved out of the case of the Rt. Rev. Dr. STEVENSON,' itinerant bishop and expounder of mysteries in these neighborhoods. The following 'fax,' gathered from several pages of detail, drawn up by the apostle himself, in view of your generous mention of him on the occasion referred to, to be transmitted for like treatment, will serve a purpose to 'the cause,' if they prove matter worthy of your metal, and are accorded the privilege of appearance in your Magazine. The sketch is biographical, and opens with the announcement: 'i was bore on the widdo 's plase in the yeare of our LORDE ano domminy 18 hunderd & 12 Being 9th of nov. the nite being varey Boistrous and the Storm varey Grate.' Some specifications follow, of the earlier portion of his life, which is so interwoven with the threads of second-party experiences, that to pursue it closely would involve other characters, whose claims upon the public are quite too insignificant to justify special advertisement.

'Information is announced, farther on, that his father removed to a Smal plase whitch he leasted durin' his life-time at the Sume of 15 dols pr anum and during that periad i com to town being 14 yeares and 28 days old, and was Bowned to learne taylerin' for the terme of 6 yeares 2 munths & 28 dayes.'

'Here happened the first crisis in the Doctor's life. He was not in the line of duty marked out for him by destiny. That became his settled conviction: 'during the periad of a Shorte time i felt inclined to warne siners to flea from the rath: tailerin' was a good Traid in its way, but i fownd i could n't fite the Battels of sin and remain at that Bisness.' The business was accordingly abandoned, and with a view to qualify himself for loftier enterprise: 'i got sum bookes and went to the studdy of morril filosiphia & CRUDEN'S Concordins.'

'Observe 'filosiphia.' There are those who would prescribe a different orthography; but the Doctor has learned a lesson in filidelfy which protects him from being led astray by false direction. Necessity compelled a suspension of his studies, and he entered the 'bute & shew-mendin' line,' which presently, 'in consequens of a cut i got wun mornin' when i got up to prepear my brecfast i persisted from follerin' of trade of whitch i tuk up the esans bisness, seling esansis of all kindes, mostly sinamont, which was most in demand, also medasin and fig-sav for burns and blisters.'

In the pursuit of barter, the DOCTOR never lost sight of his better calling, 'warning siners evry whare, wharever my lot was cast.' But of the DOCTOR 'more anon.''

'BY-THE-WAY,' interpolates a Brookville (Indiana) correspondent, in a letter recently received by the EDITOR, 'the demise of SHANGHAI has produced quite a sensation in this region, and your 'Up-River correspondent' has the credit of being extensively quoted in our western papers. K. N. PEPPER, Esq., is quite a favorite; but he has a formidable rival near this place. His last 'Pome' was delivered before a literary society, on 'The Downfall of Hungary,' and this was the chorus thereof:

1

'It was a 'thrilling production,' and, in point of pathos, equal to the 'Berd on the Fens.' Is not our friend J. E. O.,' of Boston, aware that 'Youth as it Is' has already appeared in the KNICKERBOCKER? He must