letter I have ever written to any paper, and I hope you will print

it.

AGNES R. L.

* * * * *

BOONEVILLE, CALIFORNIA.

I am eleven years old, and live in the mountains in California, among the big redwood trees. I have a doll that shuts her eyes and opens them again. We have twenty-six geese and a lot of sheep--but they are dying now--and a pet lamb. To-morrow father and brother Simon go out in the mountains to get two wild hogs that Bob Bawles killed for us to-day. I have five sisters and three brothers.

SARAH A. R.

* * * * *

SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS.

DEAR "YOUNG PEOPLE,"--Mamma gave us a year's subscription to your dear self for a birthday present, and when that expired, renewed it for a Christmas present. There are four of us boys, and our great favorite of all the papers we read, or get mamma to read to us, is YOUNG PEOPLE. We love Mr. Otis, and feel well acquainted with him and the dear Postmistress, and our little friends' letters are such pleasure to us! We copy them very often. We send you a small bouquet of violets in a box, and hope you will get them; they will be mailed with this letter. We have violets, pinks, roses, and tuberoses almost all winter. We would have sent some long ago, but mamma was too ill for us to think of anything pleasant. Our climate is so very mild that flowers, even geraniums, begonias, ice-plant, etc., grow out of doors all winter. Sometimes a frost comes and kills a few, but not often. Dear YOUNG PEOPLE, we all love you so! and when we go to New York we will call to see you. Grandpapa has been a subscriber to HARPER'S MONTHLY ever since it was first published. Mr. Nic Tengg, the bookseller here, ordered YOUNG PEOPLE for mamma, as we get all our papers through him. We will soon send something for Young People's Cot.

We can all swim, even four-year-old Edward, and ride our pony, and three of us can drive mamma's buggy all over town. We take lessons on the piano, and can sing several songs.

Your loving little admirers,

GEORGE C. F. JOSEPH F. F. STERLING I. F. EDWARD F.

"What can be in this little box, so soft, yet so bulky, and oh! so sweet?" we said, when, the other day, a box came to our office. Opening it, dear boys, there were your violets, wrapped so nicely in the wet cotton that they, were still blue and beautiful. It took us quite a little while to discover who were the kind donors, for your letter was one of a great many which came to our Post-office Box that day. But when we did find out, we stopped writing and reading long enough to waft a kiss all the way to San Antonio. How nice it is for you to be able to ride, drive, and swim, as well as to sing and play! Each of these accomplishments will have its use, and give you pleasure all your lives. We are glad your dear mother is better, and if you come to New York, we will be much pleased to see you.

* * * * *

STAMFORD, CONNECTICUT.

We have two little guinea-pigs, an old cat named Tomas, and four little bantams. I drive the old rooster all about the yard, harnessed to a little wagon. We have a nice horse named Saxon, which eats sugar. The little guinea-pigs drink coffee and eat brown paper. I am a little boy nine years old.

WILLIE R. D.

It must be fun to drive a rooster in harness, and the little wagon must look "cute." Did you begin when he was a little chick? Are you not afraid the guinea-pigs will have "nerves" if you give them coffee?

* * * * *

I haven't any pets to tell about, but I have six dolls. I live in Philadelphia all winter, but in the spring I go to Mayville, on Chautauqua Lake, near the Sunday-school Assembly Grounds. I go there a great many times, and I think it is very nice.

I have a horse of my own in Mayville. Her name is Daisy. I ride horseback on her. Once she threw me, and nearly broke my arm. It was bruised so I couldn't use it for a week.

I am beginning to get together a cabinet of curiosities. I will exchange a 25 and 50 cent stamp from Germany, a 2 and 5 cent from Finland, and 15 and 25 cent from France, and some silk cocoons and spun silk, for ore; shells, minerals, or anything fit for a cabinet.

LODIE TOURGEE, 303 S. 11th St., Philadelphia, Penn.

* * * * *

DEER MISTER HARPER,--my Pa tok yor paper for me. i be much plaes wid it. i tink "Torkin laves" is very inrestin. i got a cro an I named um Toosulom out ob de book. i cotched a Rabet an de way he did run! you ought to se um blink whin I put um in de kage. Put dis note in de paper kos I want to se how it looks.

JACOP WASHINGTON J.

Did you mean to be as funny as you could, young gentleman? We fancy it took not a little trouble to get up that bad spelling, and to put instead of capital I's those modest little i's. After all, it does not look so nicely as the letter you are going to write us next week, with every word spelled correctly, and all the capitals and stops in the right places, as prim as young ladies at a party. When you send that letter, please remember to write your address plainly in the upper right-hand corner.

* * * * *

MEADVILLE, PENNSYLVANIA.

I have been a sick boy. But as I am now much better, I hope to be well again soon.

I have asked my mamma to write for me. Mamma reads a great deal to us, and we have HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE and _St. Nicholas_.

We have them bound at the end of the year, and we think the two volumes of HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE the very nicest books we have. I have two sisters and one brother, and we have several pets--a white pony, a canary-bird, a black cat, and some _mice_.

Mamma read to us about having mice for pets in one of HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE, and I thought I would try to have some. I made a cage out of a starch box; on one side I fastened a large baking-powder can, and I put some cotton in that. I put wire netting over the front, and then I tried to catch the mice.

When I caught one, I put it in the cage, and after a few days he looked lonely, and seemed to have grown thin, so I caught another and put him in, and now they are fat, and seem very happy.

They keep pretty still all day in the dark, but at night come out in the box, and eat and nibble just enough to keep their teeth sharp, I guess.

They are cunning little creatures, and I think very nice for pets, and perhaps if you should publish this letter some other little folks would like to try the same plan.

We always enjoy the stories in YOUNG PEOPLE, but we liked "Toby Tyler" best of all.

LOUIS DE V. M.

* * * * *

OMAHA, NEBRASKA.

My little sister and I take HARPER'S YOUNG PEOPLE. She is nine, and I am twelve. My brother has a cat nine years old. He is gray, and striped with black. My aunt has a Maltese cat twenty-seven years old. I go to the Central School, and I am in the sixth class. There is a parlor game called capping rhymes. One person gives two or three lines of some piece of poetry, and some other person takes two or three lines of another piece, the first word beginning with the first letter of the last word of the preceding person's verse.

BLANCHE A.

An easier way to play at rhymes is this: I begin, for instance, by saying:

"The moon came up in the clear night sky."

Sarah follows, making a line to rhyme with mine, thus,

"As round and full as an apple-pie."

Tom's turn is next, and he says,

"Some people think it is made of cheese."

And then Theodore takes it up with,

"But that is silly, as any one sees."

* * * * *

BARTLE, INDIANA.

I am a little boy ten years old. We live in the country, on the Knobs. It is very high land; my pa says it is a thousand feet above the level of the sea. We have lots of fruit trees, mostly peaches. I have lots of peaches to eat in summer. I know a word longer than the one sent by L. L. H., of Orange, New Jersey. It is A-ber-con-way-co-pen-ha-gen-nic-o-de-mus-an-a-bap-tist-dal-a-mu-tha- o-ba-di-ah. My pa learned this word when he went to school.

FRANK C. P.

* * * * *

Exchangers will please address Alice C. Little, formerly of Institution for the Blind, Janesville, Wisconsin, at Oberlin, Ohio.

* * * * *

A WORD TO EXCHANGERS.--Do not write with pale ink, green ink, blue ink, yellow ink, red ink, or brown ink. Do not write with a lead-pencil. Write very plainly, please, with black ink, on white paper or on a postal card. Before beginning to write, think over what you have to offer, and state it as briefly as possible. We can not make room for any exchange which covers four pages of note-paper. Observe our standing notice, and always communicate by mail with the boys and girls with whom you desire to exchange before sending away your own treasures. Remember that letters which are not fully prepaid will probably go to the Dead-letter Office, and in sending heavy articles, take pains to have them weighed, and put on a sufficient number of postage stamps.

* * * * *

C. Y. P. R. U.

Lucy wants to know something about the agate. She has a very pretty one set as a breastpin, and her brother prizes agates as among the most valuable things which he collects and exchanges. They have an interesting history.

Agates are composed of layers of quartz, generally of different varieties, intimately joined together, and are found of all colors, sometimes exceedingly vivid. In modern mineralogy this stone is an impure variety of chalcedony, which derives its name from Chalcedon, that once famous city of Bithynia, in Asia Minor. The rocks near this place, which is not far from the present Scutari, contain this stone in considerable quantities. Chalcedony consists of silica and alumina, and comprises besides agate, heliotrope, onyx, plasma, and sard, differently colored by metallic oxides. It is found in grape-like masses, but more frequently in rolled pebbles. The finest Oriental chalcedony presents in its interior a fine mottled appearance.

The first engraved gem that Pliny mentions is an agate that belonged to Pyrrhus, King of Epirus. This was in the first half of the third century before Christ. The same monarch is said to have had in his possession an agate on which were figured the nine Muses, and Apollo holding a lyre; the work not of an engraver, but of Nature herself! The veins in the stone were said to be arranged so naturally that each of the Muses had her particular attribute.

At a late period, and even in the Middle Ages, it was a popular belief that the engraved gems found in digging the ground of ancient sites were natural objects, and that the representations on them were a mere natural indication of the special power or quality each possessed.

Busts and heads in full and bass relief were executed by the Romans on chalcedony in the grandest style; the finest specimens of these that we possess are the Marlborough "Medusa," and the bust of "Matidia," supported on a peacock, and three inches high. The chalcedony was supposed to cure lunatics, and make them "amiable and merry."

The agate was an object of the most fanciful delusions to the ancients. Orpheus says, "If thou wearest a piece of the tree-agate on thy hand, the immortal gods shall be pleased with thee; if the same be tied to the horns of thy oxen when ploughing, or round the ploughman's sturdy arm, wheat-crowned Ceres shall descend from heaven with full lap upon thy furrows." He adds that every kind is an antidote to the asp's bite, if taken in wine.

By burning the agate it was believed that storms would be averted, the proof of their efficacy being that if thrown into a caldron of boiling water they immediately cooled it; but in order to do good, they must be strung on the hair of a lion's mane. The stone, colored like a hyena's skin, was believed to be the cause of domestic strife, and was viewed with horror.

* * * * *

What do you think of the wardrobe of Queen Elizabeth, girls? It must have been about the most varied and extensive ever recorded in royal annals, to judge from a list of her wearing apparel recently gathered from the State papers. When the Maiden Queen was sixty-eight, and might therefore have been supposed to have outlived some of her youthful vanity, she possessed 99 complete official costumes, 102 French gowns, 100 robes with trains and 67 without, 126 antique dresses, 136 bodices, and 125 tunics, not to mention such trifles as 96 mantles, 85 dressing-gowns, and 27 fans. With all these dresses, however, it is curious to note that Queen Bess owned only nine pairs of shoes. When she died, in 1603, three thousand articles of apparel were found in her wardrobes, duly catalogued.

* * * * *

"A GERMANTOWN GIRL."--Thanks for your cordial indorsement of the article on cigarette smoking in No. 117. We hope you will ask the boys of your acquaintance to read it, and we are sure that you and your girl friends will do much to put an end to the bad habit in your set if your young gentlemen friends know that you disapprove of it.

* * * * *

Among the thousands of young people who read this paper there must be some who suffer from timidity or bashfulness. The Postmistress wishes all such to read the following quotation from an address made to children at a recent service in Westminster Abbey by Dr. Bradley, the successor of Dean Stanley, of whom you all have heard:

"Dean Stanley was, as I said, a man whom not only children, but all persons, rejoiced to meet, because, as an American whose name is known all over Europe said, at a great meeting held close by the other day, 'he was so pleasant'; simple words, but very true. Yet, strange to say, he was in his childhood and boyhood so shy and timid that his mother and his father--who, besides being a very good man, could tell stories all day about birds and insects and country life, and could draw children after him as a magnet draws the needle--were alarmed about him. They could not teach him to enjoy games like other children; and though he was not unhappy at school, they were much distressed because they could not get him to speak a word or seem happy in company. He seemed not to like--some of you, perhaps, know the feeling--to notice anything, or to be noticed when others were by him that he did not know quite well. He cured himself of this so completely that if it were not for the many letters describing him as he was then, no one would now believe this about him. How did he do so? By always trying to instruct himself about other things, and to interest himself about other people.

"It was not merely because he was so clever, and wrote such good poetry, that boys christened the corner where his little study was 'Poet's Corner,' that the Rugby boys were so fond of him, but because he was so affectionate, pure-minded, warm-hearted, and kind; and years afterward we young men, as we were at Oxford, learned to love him as our tutor, not because he was becoming famous in the land, but because he cared so much about us, and was always ready with a kind word and act, and we thought him so good. If any of the children to whom I am speaking suffer very much now, as boys and girls often do, in a way their elders never know of, from this same shyness and timidity, let them learn from the story of Dean Stanley the best way to cure themselves, and be of good cheer."

* * * * *

The members of the C. Y. P. R. U. will find in this number an interesting article, by Mrs. John Lillie, entitled "The Gavotte," giving a description of this picturesque old dance, together with a sketch of the boy life of the famous musician John Sebastian Bach. Our boy readers will be interested in the description of "Mr. Barnum's Show in Winter-Quarters," some of them may be inclined to try the Indian game of "Tchungkee," and others may like to busy themselves in the construction of "A Novel Chair-Sleigh." The girls will be interested in the story of "The Milkmaids of Dort."

* * * * *

PUZZLES FROM YOUNG CONTRIBUTORS.

No. 1.

DIAMOND.

1. A letter. 2. To descry. 3. A vulgar woman. 4. One of the United States. 5. A place where watches are manufactured. 6. A loud noise. 7. A letter.

BOB.

* * * * *

No. 2.

FOUR EASY WORD SQUARES.

1.--1. Low, wet ground. 2. Part of a circus. 3. Kingly. 4. An animal. 5. Parts of a building.

JIMMY BROWN.

2.--1. A present. 2. Unemployed. 3. To run away. 4. A bird.

3.--1. Pulverized grain. 2. A name. 3. An exclamation. 4. Final.

NELSON M.

4.--1. A number. 2. A metal. 3. Empty. 4. Extremes.

CAPTAIN KIDD.

* * * * *

No. 3.

ENIGMA.

My first in heart as well as hand. My second figures in the land. My third appears in every plain. My fourth is found in every train. My fifth in hope, but not in fear. My sixth in sound, but not in hear. My seventh rides in every drive. My eighth's in all, and in alive. My ninth's in crown, but not in ring. My tenth's a favorite with the king. My eleventh may be seen in sail. Also in storm, though not in gale. My whole's a well-known mountain chain That's girdled round by grove and plain. Poets have added to my fame, And Cooper often wrote my name.

DOLLIE.

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ANSWERS TO PUZZLES IN No. 118.

No. 1.

P P I n v a d e R L O G G R e f i n e R I E M S S p o n g e S B B Y U J a v e l i N O Y H A N a n k e e N

_Pilgrim's Progress_, by John Bunyan.

No. 2.

L ute J ars G ate A nne A lps R oof D ime N oon E lms Y ore E ase Y ear

Lady Jane Grey.

No. 3.

M O T H O G R E O L I O G R E W T I P S R E D E H O S E E W E R

No. 4.

Snow-storm. Whittier.

No. 5.

Tongue-tied. Cap-a-pie. Blackboard.

No. 6.

W H E A T T R A S H H E A T R A S H E A T A S H A T S H T H

* * * * *

Answer to Enigma on page 240--Courtship.

* * * * *

Correct answers to puzzles have been received from "Helen of Troy," Ludwdg L. Dessoir, "Commodore Nutt," Ella Price, "Fanchon," Gustave D. Mott, Georgie Wardell, Edith Abbey, Mary Hathaway, M. F. Tomes, H. L. Pruyn.

* * * * *

[_For Exchanges, see 2d and 3d pages of cover._]

PARALLELS.

ARRANGED BY G. B. BARTLETT.

There is no better amusement among the many in which old proverbs are brought to mind than the one just introduced under the above title, which exercises at the same time the inventive and guessing powers.

Any number can join in this game, which is begun by one of the players, who relates some real or fancied experience, or tells a story in which some proverb which he has in mind is expressed. The person who guesses the proverb thus indicated has to tell another story, which must be continued until it has also been guessed.

When played by a large company, it is well to divide into equal sides, arranged opposite each other in two lines. In this case the first player at the right upper side begins to tell the story, which must be guessed only on the opposite side. The guesser tells his story next, which must be guessed by some one on the right side of the room. The sides before beginning to play choose a time-keeper, who decides the duration of each contest, which should be from half an hour to an hour, according to the number of players. He keeps his watch in his hand, and calls out "Stop!" the instant the time has expired, and then declares the side to have won on which the unguessed story was being told at that moment. This keeps all the players on the alert, as each one is eager to guess while he is inventing his own story, so there may be no delay if he succeeds in guessing.

This effort to do two things at once is very good for the mental powers, as well as very amusing, as the players often become nervous and confused. The best stories are those which suggest several proverbs, as they may be guessed incorrectly at first, and thus give more time to the side on which the narrator is. To make this game clear to the youngest readers, who often play as well as their elders, a specimen of a simple story is given, as follows:

"An old farmer had lived very frugally on his farm for many years, until he had acquired a small competence. His old gray mare had worked as hard as he, and now, grown old in the service, was seldom driven fast, but went slowly from door to door, dragging the milk-cart, which stopped at every farm-house, in the morning for the full cans, and on the return trip from the station left the empty ones to be refilled. The old animal had become very lazy from this habit, and as she slowly jogged home, the old man would be able to read his daily paper, or to count over the coppers with which the sale of milk had filled the old leather bag which he always carried. One fine day, as he left the station on his homeward way, a telegram was put into his hands containing the startling news that his barn was on fire. Eager to save his stock, he plied the whip on his poor beast, whose hide was so thick that very little effect was produced. The farmer continued his blows until the whip-lash was worn out, and then tried the whip-stock, which soon broke also, and the old man was in despair, as the mare only jumped up and down, without increasing her forward progress." At this point "More haste the worse speed," is incorrectly guessed by one of the players, and the narrator proceeds: "The mare shook her head angrily, and leered at her master, showing the whites of her eyes as if in scorn, and this action reminded the farmer that she was very sensitive about the head, being always annoyed when her bridle was put on. 'Ah! old Betsey,' said he, 'I know how to make you go now;' and taking a handful of coppers from his bag, he threw them with all his might at the mare's head. Surprised at this novel attack, old Betsey darted off with the speed of an unbroken colt, and brought the old man home quicker than he had ever before gone over the road." "Money makes the mare go," guesses a player on the right, and begins the second story.

This example will show the method of playing, as the stories are as varied as the tastes of their authors, and old and young alike enjoy this game, which is adapted for the summer picnic as well as for the winter fireside.

* * * * *

The answer to the Monogram Puzzle on page 237 of No. 119 as follows:

_Swift_ ran the deer in mortal fright, Over _Hawthorne_ bushes leaping; Passing the _Hamlet_ with footsteps light, Near where the _Cooper_ his shop was keeping.

Swift (Dean), Hawthorne, Hamlet, Cooper.