So down the Geiger Grade rushed the Pioneer coach, and

before it

Leaped the wild horses, and shrieked in advance of the danger impending.

"But to be brief in my tale. Again, ere we came to the level,

Slipped from its axle a wheel; so that, to be plain in my statement,

A matter of twelve hundred yards or more, as the distance may be,

We travelled upon one wheel, until we drove up to the station.

"Then, sir, we sank in a heap; but, picking myself from the ruins,

I heard a noise up the grade; and looking, I saw in the

distance

The three wheels following still, like moons on the horizon whirling,

Till, circling, they gracefully sank on the road at the side of the station.

"This is my story, sir; a trifle, indeed, I assure you. Much more, perchance, might be said-but I hold him of all men most lightly

Who swerves from the truth in his tale. No, thank you

Well, since you are pressing,

Perhaps I don't care if I do: you may give me the same, Jim, no sugar."

MISCELLANEOUS.

A Greyport Legend.

(1797.)

THEY ran through the streets of the seaport town,
They peered from the decks of the ships that lay;
The cold sea-fog that came whitening down
Was never as cold or white as they.

"Ho, Starbuck and Pinckney and Tenterden !
Run for your shallops, gather your men,
Scatter your boats on the lower bay.

Good cause for fear! In the thick mid-day
The hulk that lay by the rotting pier,
Filled with the children in happy play,
Parted its moorings and drifted clear,—
Drifted clear beyond the reach or call,-
Thirteen children they were in all,—
All adrift in the lower bay!

Said a hard-faced skipper, "God help us all!
She will not float till the turning tide!"
Said his wife, "My darling will hear my call,
Whether in sea or heaven she bide,"

And she lifted a quavering voice and high,
Wild and strange as a sea-bird's cry,

Till they shuddered and wondered at her side.