here begins the labor of the wife, the love which is not sentimental, but earnest, the building of that spiritual hearthfire which is to keep the hearts of husband and children soft and warm. If the girls and the mothers who bring them up would only stop to consider the unpalatable truth that the woman's end of the marital yoke is much harder to support than the man's, and would act accordingly, there would be fewer disappointing and unhappy marriages.

A man through his business connections mingles constantly with the world; he meets fresh phases of life at every step, sees strange people, hears of odd occurrences and unsuspected developments of circumstances. His brain is ever on the alert, ever in use, though it may not be a very brilliant or active brain, and he is forced to advance and learn constantly. Now, when he goes home, what especial pleasure is it to him to be met by a listless, flaccid woman, who has been seated all day with her feet upon a hot-air register, with no fresher experiences to inspire her than those she may gain from a French novel?-a woman who has no hearty interest for anything, who does not even understand her own children and their needs, who cannot put warmth into the kiss with which she greets him.

There are men who would not be good husbands under any circumstances, and many men who are good husbands in the main, have faults which the best of wives cannot overcome, because they are bred in them by the unequal position of the sexes, and their consequent impressions regarding women. But the average man will fulfill his half of the marital bargain, provided the woman will accomplish hers, for the wife is a possession which selfishness prompts him to value.

The woman who wishes to keep the atmosphere of her home vigorous is not necessarily intellectual, but she is necessarily active and alive to many interests. There is no especial virtue in domestic labor, unless it is rendered pressing by narrow means, but it is much better for a woman to make fires and sweep than to sit and do nothing. Her effort should be always in some way to keep apace with her husband and children, so that they do not find her, as a rule, dull and unspontaneous; to form her opinions upon a groundwork of common sense, so that they will not deserve the anathema of "woman's reasons." In short, it is as much a woman's business as a man's to work and live in an active existence of some kind, and if she passes her days in a listless and idea-less indolence, she must not complain if her husband seems cold, and if her children grow up without feeling in any good direction the effect of the motherly influence and care. M. H. FORD.

What I Know About Medicine.—There is no mistake, my baby is a lovely baby, white and plump, and wholesome to look upon. I can afford to be foolish over him, but the way Nicodemus grins and screws up his face and chirps to him is unbearable. Now the first thing I intend to do is to study medicine, that I may know how to doctor him. "Nicodemus-eh! Nicodemus, I say!"

Nicodemus rushed in with his foolish mouth wide open, and a great splash of ink on one side of his nose.

"What is it, little woman-what is it? Nothing the matter of little Nick ?"

"Sit right down there, Nicodemus, I have something to say, and business to do."

Nicodemus put his finger side of his nose, but I pulled it down, for I would not stand nonsense.

"You see, Nicodemus, I am well provided for; there is the silver porringer, there is the coral rattle with silver bells, and there is the baby.”

"To be sure," muttered Nicodemus. "Now do hold that foolish tongue of yours. to study medicine."

"Wonderful little woman!"

I'm going

"Oh, Nicodemus! It is not the doctor, but a book, I want to buy, and set myself to study the ills that flesh is heir to."" "Wonderful woman!"

Nicodemus went out, and I sat contemplating the baby sleeping like an angel under his canopy of lace. There is no mistake, however. His nose is a pug. Mine is high Roman; but Nicodemus is unfortunate in his nose, and so the baby suffers. It was not long before Nicodemus was heard groaning at the door under pretense that the "Family Physician" was of great weight.

I seized it indignantly and turned to "Infantile Diseases." I read on and on, and then rushed to baby's crib, and with my thumb and finger opened his mouth. Mercy! how he doubled himself the wrong way! But I had made a discovery. He had the red gum, "red goom," nurse told about.

"Sally Minnikin, run straight to the druggist and buy me some honey in this china mug, and some borax." While she was gone I took a piece of fine lawn and tied it to a stick for a swab, while my poor Nicodemus stood by exclaiming : "Wise little woman! Wonderful woman!"

The next thing was to swab out his mouth and thus kill the disease in its incipiency. I was quite frightened at the way he kicked and screamed and sputtered the stuff about.

"I am sure a mother needs wisdom and strength no less, I said to Nicodemus. But I went on to study other complaints, and grew quite sick of heart to see how many bad symptoms little Nick had. I was sure he had scarlet fever and nettle-rash, and a few other diseases of the kind.

Nicodemus scuffled in his slippers up and down the room, trying to still the screeching, while I turned to the article Colic. Yes, he most assuredly had an alarming attack.

"Run, Sally Minnikin, and get me some coriander. Poor child he will have a fit, and what shall I do?"

Then I turned to Fits, and looking at little Nick's hands clenched, with the thumbs in the palm, and his face as red as a beet, I was sure he would go into a fit. I rang the bell and directed hot water and the bath tub at once.

"Poor little baby! Such a sudden change! Oh! what if he should die?" I cried, bursting into tears.

The coriander was cooled and sweetened, and then came the tug of war to get it down little Nick's throat. He spluttered and kicked, and gurgled in the throat, but not one drop would he swallow. Then I held his nose-and he could do nothing else, and down it went. Oh, what a cruel trial it was! and there stood Nicodemus, with his face puckered in commiseration, or something else, and could not help me in the least. At last I got the baby's clothes off his back and put him into the tub-it might have been a trifle too hot-poor baby! for he shrieked fearfully, and grew cherry-red, but eventually he dropped away to sleep like a little lamb, and I renewed my study of the "Family Physician, and feeling myself entirely upset, I turned to complaints of the nervous system.

"Nicodemus dear," I said quite humbly, "I am on the verge of a nervous fever; please get me some valerian and a Dover's powder."

Nicodemus-good soul-stooped down and kissed my forehead, and went out to procure the medicine, and I looked at poor little Nick, sobbing in his sleep and starting now and then with a sharp cry. I am sure he is dangerously ill, and I am now too much exhausted to study Buchan and learn what to do for him. Oh! what a blessed boon to mothers is that "Family Physician"! How many children have escaped an untimely grave by the help of those heavenly decoctions, which relieve all their sufferings. I neglected the study of medicine too long, but if my life is spared, I will make up for lost time. How I envy these noble women who devote their lives to this humane study-who go about with little skulls in their satchel, and fibulas and tibulas and all that, to dissect as they get time, and are never without a pill or a powder in case of an emergency.

By this time Nicodemus came in with the valerian and Dover's powder. He mixed the latter himself. As he gave me the spoon, hardly able to speak from tears and anxiety, I said:

“Nicodemus, be a man, and never mind the tantrums of that girl. With Dr. Buchan she would soon be down with every disease in the medical vocabulary, and kill poor little Nick outright.” And she kissed me and laughed, and kissed till I laughed, and Nicodemus laughed, and the baby crowed and kicked, quite himself again.

This ended my study of medicine. I was ashamed to ask for another copy of Dr. Buchan, and contented myself after this, in true matrimonial style, to raise my babies without coriander, and to visit all my vagaries upon Nicolemus, who is such a model of patience and harmless goodness, that, in spite of his pug-nose, I am obliged to think him the best man in the world, though he refuses to let me ever take another Dover's powder.

ELIZABETH OAKES SMITH.

Victorious Failures.-Paradoxical as the title of this paper may seem, it is in reality not so; for while there are many victories as disastrous as defeats, so there are many defeats which are equivalent to victories. A failure may be pronounced a success in the same ratio that it leads to ultimate triumph. There is a deep and world-wide significance in the legend of King Robert Bruce and the spider. Whether the story be true or not I do not care; it answers my purpose. Again and again was the spider beaten back in the endeavor to accomplish its engineering feat; and yet seeming failure was but the nurse of courage till at length final victory crowned its enterprise. Given proportionate energy and determination in the breast of every man, and he might move mountains. He would be proof against defeat, invincible against fate. For many weary years Bruce was to all seeming a hopeless adventurer, schooled in hardship and stricken by adversity. For long, we are told, he listened in Highland glens to the bay of the bloodhounds on his track, or held single-handed a pass against a crowd of savage clansmen. It seemed incredible that such an one should ever come to wear the crown of Scotland. But all his severe training was not actual failure; it was the pre

him one stage nearer the goal; and how, then, can such enterprises be termed failures?

I was now floating-floating away. I saw a ship come nigh and I went on board; then I saw heaps and heaps of diamonds and pearls and rubies, and a little man with a big head and legs of no account told me to kiss him, and I wouldn't; and then I was sailing down on an iceberg with two white bears, who hugged up little Nick, and made faces at me; then I was in a land of such lovely flowers and sweet music, and pretty children-all sucking their thumbs and eating coriander; women were sitting round a big caldron making a stew-I looked in, and there was poor little Nick bubbling up and down. I screamed, I suppose, for Nicodemus had me in his arms, crying bitterly, and saying, "Poor little woman!"

"Poor little woman, indeed!" It was my mother's voice. Poor little fool!" And she opened the window and threw the Family Physician" out on the head of a policeman who happened to be under the window.

Seneca says that a virtuous man struggling with misfortune is such a spectacle as gods might look upon with envy; and we may of course widen the scope of that word virtuous to include all brave spirits struggling after noble and definite ends. If failure and success are to be measured by the immediate effects which human actions produce upon mankind, then some of our best and greatest men were conspicuous failures. Take one or two examples as they occur to us. On a certain Sunday in February, 1526, Cardinal Wolsey sat in great state in old St. Paul's. Beneath the pulpit were gathered baskets of books, which were speedily to be burned in the fire lighted before the great cross. These were Tyndale's Testaments, produced with great labor and under severe hardship, and given to the people of England to be their moral and spiritual life-blood. They were all destroyed, and ten years later the body of Tyndale also had perished like his books in the flames. But was the truth stamped out? On the contrary, it rose again stronger than ever.

And Tyndale, was he defeated and his work a

Think, again, of Avisseau, the potter of Tours. Three hundred years had passed away since Palissy had died and carried with him his secret to the grave. Avisseau aspired to bring back to men the knowledge of the lost art. But he labored on, day and night, apparently in vain. His goods were sold and he lost all; and at length he was driven to exclaim, "Ah, could I but buy one piece of gold with a whole cupful of my blood!" Surely here was failure blank and utter!

No; daylight was in view, though the world saw it not. Avisseau had a wife cast in the same noble and heroic mould as himself. She gazed lovingly and lingeringly upon her wedding-ring, but at last drew the little sacred thing from her finger and gave it to her husband. "'Tis our own," she said; "then take the gold and melt it down." It was a moment of terrible agony for the man of science, but his wife insisted upon the talisman going into the crucible. The anxious moments passed, and it was found that the sacrifice had not been made in vain: Avisseau rediscovered the secret of enameled gold. No failure here.

Another and more recent example where the human mind has risen beyond the depressing influence of failure is furnished by the career of Sir Walter Scott. At fifty-five he found himself burdened with a debt of over half a million. How he set about the Herculean task of paying this, with what zeal and success he labored on till death overtook him, every one knows. Instances like these might be easily multiplied.

Failure may be regarded as success in so far as it leads to renewed effort. Of course there may be instances when no amount of application in the same field can bring about the desired end; and in these cases perseverance must necessarily be foolish and futile. But these examples are exceedingly rare. In the realms of thought, imagination, and science, failures to-day are but the groundwork of success to-morrow. Original minds in past centuries dimly saw the possibilities which we have made actual, and their failures to translate their nebulous ideas into action cannot in any sense be regarded as defeats. They originated principles which have since been translated into grand concrete forms, and were therefore the pioneers of these later days.

Failure results in many instances from our not having a precise and definite object in view. Hence, Cervantes makes the inimitable Sancho Panza say, "Some people go out for wool and come home shorn." Numbers of individuals start out for the Land of Promise, but beat a precipitate retreat immediately they sniff the nauseous odor of the Slough of Despond; and perhaps it is as well this should be so, for if they cannot combat the initial trials of the campaign, how would they fare when the battle should wax hot with them in the Valley of Great Controversy? Now to a lofty sou!, fully conscious of the nobility and grandeur indwelling with it, trials act but as incentives, and the brambles which prick and sting suffice to rouse him when he is in danger of sleeping the sleep of death. But there is forced upon us the melancholy reflection that too often the goal aspired after is as inadequate to satisfy the mind as are the difficulties great and numberless through which the man passes to attain to

powers, always remembering that he who aims high is sure to achieve more than he who is contented with a lower and meaner horizon. Every man has within his grasp, at least, to achieve one great and noble success, and that is a good life. This no one can mar but himself, and if it be a failure at the last, on his head alone must rest the blame. Live nobly, and heaven itself will preserve thy fame. But to do this, a man must live conscientiously, manfully, virtuously. He must have that sheet-anchor of the soul, faith in Providence; and then, if all his earthly aff irs should have stamped upon them the world "failure," he himself will remain calm and unmoved amidst the wreck of all things. His life is not a failure who through every reverse of fortune attains a higher manhood.

Infinite in number, and as various in character, are our human ambitions. These goals of success are, indeed, coextensive with the race itself, for what man indulges precisely the same desires and day-dreams as his brother? Many of these ambitions are of a mean and vulgar type, and we may without scruple or lack of generosity rejoice when they result in failure. The time will come-though it is still far distant-when even the ambition of the warrior will be stripped of its false glory and grandeur, and he himself stand exposed as one of the greatest enemies of humanity. He has too long already retarded the march of mankind; and not until the sword has been returned to its scabbard, nevermore to be unsheathed, will men feel that they are brothers, and join hand to hand in the great victory of right over might. Meanwhile, we gaze through the vista of past ages, and almost insensibly breathe a wish to follow after and emulate the spirit of a veritably great man. Who is this hero? It is not Cæsar, as, after the defeat of Scipio and the capture of Pompey, he enters Rome amid unparalleled honors and congratulations; it is not Mahomet, after he has overrun the various kingdoms of Asia and Africa, and forced his new religion upon the conquered; it is not Archimedes, as he rushes through the streets of Syracuse, shouting, "Eureka! Eureka!" it is not Nelson, as, in the flush of victory he breathes his last, exclaiming, “Thank God, I have done my duty!" it is not Columbus, when, after seasons of disappointment and deeds of cruelty, he sights the far-off land, and his eyes swim with exultant tears; it is not Wellington, as he cries, "Up, guards, and at them!" and forthwith wins the great battle of all modern campaigns. No, it is none of these. But the scene is yonder at Rome, where stands one heavily bound with chains. His only crime has been that of living too purely and unselfishly. He has been before his judges, and is now led forth to execution. Here is human nature risen to its highest glory. Paul, formerly called Saul of Tarsus, a persecutor of the saints, dies for his faith, after a warfare that has embraced within it all trials, difficulties, and dangers. To the spectators of his martyrdom, here was a great and ignominous failure. The world, however, has long since crowned him victor, and the friendless martyr now occupies almost the largest space in its history, while his influence, ever-widening, will extend to the very latest generations of the human race.

G. BARNETT SMITH.

What was my little secret?

Don't you think you can guess?

F. E. HAMILTON.

sure she has transcendent abilities in other than scholastic directions which they should be able to employ. Here it is that the cool impudence of her genius is seen. She comes out boldly with a request so astounding that she no doubt calculated that the minds of the Commissioners would be temporarily stunned, so that they would at once accede to her request. She wants them to create a new office and install her in it without delay. And such an officer as she asks to be made! The fertile inventiveness of United States customs' collectors in its wildest throes of title-parturition, when some political hack, some friend of the Secretary, some "eminent worker" was to be rewarded with some sinecure, was never blest with such a felicitous suggestion as occurs like a happy inspiration to this Western dame after her defeat as an applicant to be made a teacher. No higher praise than this could be paid her genius. She wishes to be made Bouncer in ordinary to the honorable Board of Commissioners.

That she is more than abundantly able (she no doubt felt that she was treading upon firmer ground now than when she rashly sought to become a teacher) to perform the arduous duties of such a post, she refers them to common fame, to the many residents of the county who knew her, and in particular to her "6 former husband." What a vision comes before the mind's eye of that trembling apparition, her "former husband"! Ah! no doubt he " could a tale unfold,"

"GENTLEMEN: Having been defeated for a position in the public schools of Storey County, I hereby apply for the position of Bouncer for the Commissioners; the said office to be created at your next meeting. With reference to my ability, I refer you to my former husband and many other residents of Storey County. Hoping to receive the consider ition of your honorable body, I remain, most respectfully yours,

"A DEFEATED SCHOOLMARM."

Could anything be more delicate and womanly than this plea? It is difficult for us, who are so far from the scene, to form a clear notion of just how the case stands. It would seem, however, that schools in Nevada counties must be under the management of a Board of Commissioners. Here

is a person who has a "former husband" and whose striking characteristics are well known to "many other residents of Storey County," who has made application for a position in the public schools and been rejected. The reason is not given. But it is not hard to imagine that this "former hus band" incident and her general reputation with " many other residents" had some influence in preventing her appointment as a teacher of youth. The Commissioners, perhaps, did not care to have their daughters come under the influence of a person who had a "former husband." But the person in question is not daunted by defeat. If the Commissioners cannot open the public schools to her, she is

she seeks. How one aches to know how many were the years of his probabtion with this new Xantippe! Did she bounce him often? One tries to think of his coming home a little late; but the subject becomes too painful for thought by the time one reaches the door. One turns back with instinctive horror. One is afraid, even in thought, of being himself bounced. Ah, yes! and the neighbors-the "many other residents of Storey County" who could testify of her ability-did she make it too warm for them, did she bounce them, or had they stood by and seen her, and admired her science, as she bounced her "former husband"? One thinks involuntarily of red hair and arms akimbo when one tries to fancy this "defeated schoolmarm"; a harsh, high-keyed, threatening voice could alone do justice to the tone of defiance that breathes through her words. And now this termagant, this escaped Tartar, this untamed shrew, wants to be Bouncer to the Board. She does not explain what she conceived the duties of such an office would be. Can it be that the Commissioners of Education in Nevada are so beset with malcontents, and complaining parties and bores, that such an officer is needed to preserve their peace? One can easily imagine that abont an editor's sanctum such a person would be a great convenience. But any reasonable man, or set of men, who valued peace of mind would hesitate to put it in peril by placing in such an office a woman who had a "former husband" to whom she could refer for her definess in bouncing. Would not one stand in constant fear of being bounced himself?