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"Alderney," how shall I choose?

Is "English" or "Foreign" the better box? Quick! not a moment to lose,

In with it into the letter-box

Sure to go right in the end:

Sorters will sort it-they're paid for it— In with it! I apprehend

That if wrong it will not be delayed for it.

Many a man is debarred

From posting a paper, a letter, a Circular, package, or card

By his knowledge of places, &c.

Some people, rather than show

That they're not very good at topography, Pocket their letters, and go

To borrow or buy a geography.

Shutters come down with a bang

(I never cared for the banging part); Some people mutter "Oh, hang!"

Some people vary the hanging part. Never say that in a crowd,

Not a judicious experimentExpletives spoken aloud

Are but a signal for merriment.

Laughs when a letter is gripped,
Nothing at all to the laughter it
Causes when fingers are nipped

That enter the aperture after it.
Often are caught—as the clock's
Striking-the heads of a stick or two,

Put to keep open the box;

Harder than fingers and thicker too.

Now for the coves that are late:

Sometimes there's only a few of them-
Only some seven or eight;

Sometimes a dozen or two of them.
But let them chance to be few,

Or let them chance to be numerous,
Being condemned to the two
Stamps is regarded as humorous.

Many and many a time

I-very probably most of us-
Go and remain for the chime

Of six at the General Post Office.

And it is sure to amuse

Us when we light upon any one
Forced-as related-to use

A twopenny stamp for a penny one.

EDWIN HAMILTON.

[From "Dublin Doggerels."-By kind permission of the author.]

HUMAN NATURE.

Two little children five years old,
Marie the gentle, Charlie the bold;
Sweet and bright and quaintly wise,
Angels both, in their mother's eyes.

But you, if you follow my verse, shall see,
That they were as human as human can be,
And had not yet learned the maturer art
Of hiding the "self" of the finite heart.

One day they found in their romp
Two little rabbits soft and gray-

and play

Soft and gray, and just of a size,

As like each other as your two eyes.

All day long the children made love

To their dear little pets-their treasure-trove;
They kissed and hugged them until the night
Brought to the conies a glad respite.

Too much fondling doesn't agree
With the rabbit nature, as we shall see,
For ere the light of another day

Had chased the shadows of night away

One little pet had gone to the shades,
Or, let us hope, to perennial glades
Brighter and softer than any below-
A heaven where good little rabbits go.

The living and dead lay side by side,
And still alike as before one died;

And it chanced that the children came singly to view
The pets they had dreamed of all the night through.

First came Charlie, and, with sad surprise,
Beheld the dead with streaming eyes;

Howe'er, consolingly, he said,

"Poor little Marie-her rabbit's dead!"

Later came Marie, and stood aghast;

She kissed and caressed it, but at last

Found voice to say, while her young heart bled,

"I'm sorry for Charlie-his rabbit's dead!"

ANONYMOUS.

[From "Harper's Magazine."]

THE ENCHANTED SHIRT.

The King was sick. His cheek was red,
And his eye was clear and bright;
He ate and drank with a kingly zest,
And peacefully snored at night.

But he said he was sick, and a king should know,
And doctors came by the score,

They did not cure him. He cut off their heads,
And sent to the schools for more.

At last two famous doctors came,
And one was as poor as a rat,—
He had passed his life in studious toil,
And never found time to grow fat.

The other had never looked in a book;
His patients gave him no trouble:
If they recovered, they paid him well;
If they died, their heirs paid double.

Together they looked at the royal tongue,
As the King on his couch reclined;
In succession they thumped his august chest,
But no trace of disease could find.

The old sage said, "You're as sound as a nut." "Hang him up," roared the King in a galeIn a ten-knot gale of royal rage;

The other leech grew a shade pale;

But he pensively rubbed his sagacious nose,
And thus his prescription ran—

The King will be well, if he sleeps one night
In the Shirt of a Happy Man.

Wide o'er the realm the couriers rode,

And fast their horses ran,

And many they saw, and to many they spoke,
But they found no Happy Man.

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They saw two men by the roadside sit,
And both bemoaned their lot;
For one had buried his wife, he said,
And the other one had not.

At last they came to a village gate,
A beggar lay whistling there!

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He whistled, and sang, and laughed, and rolled
On the grass in the soft June air.

The weary courtiers paused and looked

At the scamp so blithe and gay;

And one of them said, "Heaven save you, friend!
You seem to be happy to-day."

"O yes, fair sirs," the rascal laughed, And his voice rang free and glad;

"An idle man has so much to do That he never has time to be sad."

"This is our man," the courier said;
“Our luck has led us aright.

I will give you a hundred ducats, friend,
For the loan of your shirt to-night."

The merry blackguard lay back on the grass,
And laughed till his face was black;

"I would do it, God wot," and he roared with the fun, "But I haven't a shirt to my back."

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