Little Feet on the Fender. In my heart there liveth a pioture a kitchen rude and old, Where the firelight tripped o'er the rafters And reddened roof's brown mold) Gilding the steam from the kettle That hummed on the foot-worn hearth, Thronghont the livelong evening, Its measures of drowsy mirth. Because of tho three lig'ht shadows That frescoed the rudold room Because of the voioos echoed Up 'mid the rafters' gloom Because of the feet on the fender, Six restless, white little feet The thoughts of that dear old kitchen Are to me so dear and sweet. When the first dash on the window Told of the coming rain, Oh I where are the fair young faois That crowded again the pane ? While bits of firelight stealing, Their dimpled checks between, Went struggling out in darkness, In threads of silver aheen. Two of the feet grew weary One dreary, dismal day, And we tied them with snow-white ribbons, Leaving them there by the way. There was fresh clay on the fondor That weary wint'ry night, For the four little feet had tracked it From his' grave on the brown hill's height. Oh ! why on this darksome evening, This evening of rain and sleet, Best my feet all alone on the hearthstone ? Oh ! where are those other feet? Are they treading the pathway of virtue That will bring us together above ? Or have thoy made steps that will dampen A sister's tireless lore ? THE POSTILION. We were traveling in France, and chancing to stop over night at a neat little hotel in a wayside village, fonnd onr attention attracted to a one-armed gray-haired man dressed as an old-time postilion, whose pleased.Bimpla look do noted that he was not qnite right in his mind. On questioning the landlady abont him, she gave us this singular history: I will begin, said she, by telling you that his name is Jean Louis, and twenty-five years ago be was the best-looking lad in the village. He had light, curly hair, beautiful white teeth, deep blue eyes, that had one cf the most tender, languishing looks you ever saw. At the same time, among the girls of the vil lage, there was one rather pretty, with a good, fresh complexion, and bappy.joy ous disposition, who, when she was quite a little girl, they had named Francoise la Belle Brune. Now, Jean Louis and La Belle Brune were neighbors. Jean Louis' mother wns a poor old widow, who lived by the product of her spinning-wheel and Jean Louis' wages. La Belle Brune wns the daughter of the postmaster of the district, who was a great man in these parts, and the report wan that when his daughter married he would count down ten thousand francs as her dot that which you call marriage portion or dowry and that was looked upon as a fortune among us. The consequence was, that when Sun day came round and La Belle Brune.ao cornpaniod by her father, went to church, more than one of our young men gazed upon her, more than one mother gave her a friendly greeting, and more than one voice whispered as she passed "Lucky i3 the fellow who will persuade her to change her name for his." Bat La Balle Brune only loved the look, the emile and the voice of Jean Louis. When at day-dawn Jean Louis htarted for the fields, it was a rare circumstance if he, instead of taking the short cut across the meadow, did not glide round toward the abode of the postmaster, and lie hidden in a thick mass of honey suckle, waiting patiently till La Belle Brune opened her window, and, apply ing her fingers to her lips, the young girl sent him with her innocent smile the morning's benediction and kiss. This happinetis lasted two years. One day, old man Martin for that was the name which the postmaster went by said to his daughter: 'My child, do you know that you are twenty years old, and not married yet? It is time that you should make your choice. Already people begin to talk about you in the village, and wonder why you are not. Madame Sach-aud Such a-One. From astonishment to calumny there is only one step, and if you persist in your refusal, a up to this time you have done, of the richest and most eligible young men in the place, they will not fail to remark that underneath this re fusal something extraordinary must lie an extravagant vanity.or silly coquet ry, or what is still worse, a guilty love affair. I will not allow this state of things, and they must end. Bo now, I give you a fortnight wherein to make your choice; if by that time you have not done so, I will choose for you.' Li Belle Brune knew her father thor oughly, and that when he said 'I will,' there was no struggling against him so she determined to cut the knot and es cape from the equivocal position which chanee, her heart, and Jean Louis, had combined to form for her. She was perfectly aware that Jean Louis was one of those lads that are supremely happy if they can only get a squeeze of the hand, or the shadow of a kiss; she knew very well that, happy in loving, happy in knowing himself loved, he was quite capable of asking no more, and of going on waiting till eternity. Wait ing for what? He himself could not tell; but he felt a presentiment that there were almost insurmountable obstacles to his marriage with La Belle Brune with her rich dot; and he felt that he was not iu the position to overcome them. Now, La Belle Brune began to see very clearly that instead of falling, the obstacles closed arouud them, and that at some early day they would become insuperable so she took Up her pen and boldly wrote to Jean Louis as fol lows: 'My father has desired me to marry some one. Go to him to-morrow, and say that you love me, and that I like wise love you, and ask him for my hand.' Seldom had a young girl taken a like step; never to her knowledge had a maiden said to a young man, who had not addressed a single word of love to her: you love me, and I return your af fection. Yet, what was to be done? The following day Jean Louis dressed in all his be6t, presented himself before old Monsieur Martin, and said 'Pere Martin, I hear that you wish to get your daughter married; and I am come to ask her hand of you.' For a moment Pere Martin was as tounded, and then looked sternly at the applicant. 'Are you mad, Jean LouiB?' said Pere Martin, with a harsh tqne. 'No, my father,' interposod La Belle Brune, as she came unshrinkingly be tween them during the conference, as if in orJer, by her presence, to establish an equality of strength between the speakers. ''No father, Jean Louis is not mad. He loves mo, and knows that I love him, and it is in consequence of my avowal of my love for him that he asks my hand. You told me to choose a hus band. I have chosen; and Jean Louis is my choice.' I will not attempt to describe to you the fury of Pere Martin, for at that time ho was accustomed to see all about him bend under his hand and before his iron will. He saw his own child declare her solf in open rebellion against the pater nal authority. He answered iu a loud and imperious tone of voice. He heaped curses and threats on the heads both of Jean Louis and his daughter, and swore hat as long as he lived, his daughter should never be the wife of It common laborer, who had not even a lllf to shel ter her, nor a fixed business jb support her. After having threatened , ho beg ged and prayed; after having expended his vocabulary cf curses, b began to reason with the couple, and laid before them the following propositions: 'As for my rich daughter, it is neces sary that she should have a husband who has some means; as for myself, I require a son -in-law who will carry on the business to which I owe so much. Let Jean Louis since it is this young man that you love so well let mm la aside the pick and the plow, which to this dav have only just kept body an sul togetherjlet hiru. put on a postilion's jacket; prove himself to bo zealous, ao tive and economical most absolutely essential this,latter; let him amass a dot: and then you, my daughter, shall be hia If he can't do that, he shall not have you.' The conditions were sufHjiently rca -sonablt', and La Belle Bruno acce red them. It was agreed upon, after much discussion, tlutt the day when Jean Louis should become possessed of fifteen hun dred francs, Pere Martin would call him son-in-law. In order to arrive at this little patrimony, five years were granted to Jean Louis. If at the expiration of five years he did not produce the requir ed sum, then the engagement should be at an end, aiid La Belle Brune must be come the wife of the man whom her father (should choose. The following day Jean Louis pulled on his long boots. In less than a year he had become the most agile, the smartest, and wonder -ful to relate the boldest postilion of Bourget. His savings increased daily, and you can well understand how beau tiful and seductive were the hopes en tertained by the two lovers. One fatal day, toward the end of 1846, during a fearful storm, a post chaise stopped at Pere Martin's house. One young man alone occupied the carriage. Pere Martin urged upon him the pru dence of waiting until the storm had somewhat abated.for the thunder rolled with deafening violence. The young man declared that it would be impossi ble to stop, alleging that a few minutes' delay might be of serious eonsequenoe to him. We learnt later that he was the cashier of one of the largest banks in Paris, and that ha was flying across the frontier carrying with him a large amount of tho funds intrusted to his care. Pere Martin was compelled to yield to tho persistant entreaties of the traveler. i Jeau Louis jumped into his saddle, and away the carriage rolled into the storm. They had brdly gone two miles when a flash of lightning more vivid than any heretofore struck with its bolt one of the tall Loabardy poplars that bordered the roud. The horses, for an instant, stood shuldoring, and then dashed blindly alopg the road until, meeting with some boataolo there was a sudden Crash, a groan and fragments of the post-chaise wsre lying in all di rections. Some people, living near, ran to the spot ; and facte, nearly side by side, were tho youu i traveler and Jean Lonis. After severij days of horrible suffering, the former died. As to Jean Louis, he had to snltnit to the loss of his right arm, and tie terrible operation of trepanning. He recovered his health but his reason had fled forever. Since that time tin poor fellow has not ceased to consider himself still a postilion, and that ai Boon as he has saved fifteen hundred francs he will marry La Balle Brnn. Seel he wakes up; do you notice that) for the diligence from Paris on't be lng before it gets here. He JU run ahiad of it; he will run by the side of thehorses just in tho same way you saw bin: do to your dili gence. As soon 83 ever it stops, he ac costs the passengers wth his customary sentence, and carefrily stows away whatever they may give him. This evening he will bring ue his little daily gatherings, with these words: 'Put this with the rest, Madame 3enoit, and when the fifteen hundred frarcs are complete, let me kuow.for then I shall go and find Pere Martin, and he is.ionnd to give me La Balle Brune, at onci, for you know he promised her to me.' And La Belle Brune what became of her? A3 she would have religiously kept the word she gave to Jem Louis, so sue sacredly performed the (romise she had given to her father shobecamo the wife of the man that he chosefor her, without actual love for him, nor ret rot without esteeming him. To-day, her name is Widow Benoit--at your savice; she takes care of Jean Louis, who joes not recog nize her any more, and ottentolls her in confidence, that he vail have the pleas ure of dancing with hr, the day that he has the happiness tf marry La Belle Brune. You see, moviour and mad a me; that the crazinees of Jean Louis is neith er so very bad, nor so very miserable. He lives in a dreatt of happiness. Hap py, most happy, ihey who dream I The Resultt of an Elopement Two months ago Dr. Pierce, of Facto ry ville, Pa., nar Waverley, N. Y., de serted his wilb and family, and eloped With Mrs. K.ggs, the wife of his hired man. He had the day before prescribed some medi'ine for his wife, who was ill. After the flight of her husband Mrs. Pierce tok the medicine and died a few hours afterward. Pierce and Mrs. Riggs went to Texas, the woman taking her little boy, four years old, with her.- Shortb after taking up their residence in Tas, Pierce subjected Mrs. Biggs and ler boy to the most btutol treat ment. Three weeks ago Mrs. Eiggs, taking advantage of the absence of ltrce. toon S1UU of his and ilea with ct child. Pierce got track of her and ful lowed her. She eluded him, nnd reached her father in Spencer, She had been very sick on her way from Texas, and died very soon after entering her father's house. Tierce followed her as far as Elmira, whero he was warned that he would be summarily dealt with if ho entered Factoryville, and he fled in time to escape arrest on a charge of "murdering his wife. What the European Powers Want. The European powers appear to be still hankering after fresh annexations in the East, England demanding the Khybar and Khnruni Passes from the Afghan ameer, France still looking long ingly at Tunis, and the two together pressing upon the khedive the adoption of a European ministry, while Eufsia is claiming various privileges from .China in exchange for the cession of a province which she can retake at any moment. Probably the best solution of the Egypt ian question would be a joint protecto rate, the khedive being evidently not to be trusted. Eagland from Cyprus, and France from her proposed settle ment on the coast of Tunis, would mount guard over Egypt, and the splendid re sources of the Nile delta would be de veloped by European capital. But it may well be doubted whether such an arrangement could be lasting. 'Egypt,' said the first Napoleon, 'is the key of the Est, and France eannot leave it to Eagland.' Still less can Eagland leave it to France, and the annexation of Cyprus may yet prove to have been the prelude of that English occupation of Egypt with which the Czar Nicholas tempted Sir Hamilton Seymour twenty six years ago. A Savannah man fattens his horse on noe for 9 cents a day. Use of Coffee. Much more coffee is used here than in any country on the globe, France be ing the only land that consumes any thing like an equal amount. While tea has taken the place of coffee here to a certain extent within a few years, this is mainly iu cities and large towns; and there in no probability of its becoming the national beverage, as it has become in Russia and largely in England. Cof fee, although unknown to the Greeks or Romans, has been used from time im memorial iu Abyssinia and Ethiopia; since the fifteenth century in Arabia, and since the sixteenth over the remain der of the East. Toward the close of the following century, the plant was car ried by Wieser, a Netuerland burgo master, from Mooha to Batavia (Java), where it was widely reproduced, and ere long shoots were sent to Amsterdam, and theDee to the Botanical Garden at Paris. Coffee was first drank in Egypt and Turkey in the sixteenth century, having been brought from Arabia; and Leonhard Eauwolf, a German physician, was probably the first to make it known in Europe, through his travels, publish ed in 1573. Coffee-houses soon sprang up in different countries of Europe, the earliest in Constantinople (1551). and the next in London, the year subse quent. This one was Kept in Uornhill by a Greek, one Pasouet. the servant of an Englishman named Edwards, who had brought some coffee with him from BmyruR. The first coffee-house in France wasopenedin 1C71, in Marseilles, and a few months later Paris imitated the example. Before the civil war, coffee-houses, as they are called, were very common in the West and South, and are still, tho name boing applied to bar rooms probably beouuno almost every thing except coffee could be had there. The consumption of coffee has increased very rapidly throughout the republic, the poorest people drinking the pure article, so far as they can get it; whilo iu Europe generally the comparatively well-to-do alono can afford the luxury. The chief substitutes, such as barley, crusts, beans, chiccory, are seldom em ployed iu this country, moBt Americans preferring to go without than not to have the real thing. Coffee is an abso lute necessity with no. being drank in the laborer's cabin no less than in the rich man's borne from Maine to Califor nia, from Florida to Washington Terri tory, it is said that we import now about 300,000.000 pounds annually, val ued at over 825,000,000, and our yearly increase in the Inst quartar of a century is estimated at 8 J- per cent, against 2 in Europe, and 4 per cent, for the whole worli A Revolution iu Sentiment. The Baltimore Sun. commenting od the sentence of Poindextor in Richmond for the killing of Curtis for an alleged insult offered to tho former's betrothed, says: Tho address of John E. Poindex ter on being brought up to receive sen tence for manslaughter in killing young Curtis, is touching and pathetic. But at the same time it is the fullest testimony to the justice and the expediency of his conviction that could be presented. The verdict, he said, 'if ratified by this community, makes mo the first victim of a revolution in a traditional sentiment of my native State that has educated me to believe that the defense of woman is one of the first duties a man owes to himcelf and Eociety.' First, however, one should be sure that the defense was needed. But tho 'sentiment,' as he con strued it, was an exaggerated and dan gerous misconception of a supposed social duty, and the revolution was wrought principally, or immediately, anyhow, by his own very deed. The sort of punctilio which, in that commu nity, used to insist that a supposed lack of courtesy to a lady could only be wiped out in blood has long been overstrained, and was eimply outraged and fell into collapse in the presence of Poindexter's deed. That which carried this false and foolish code for false and foolish it is, though founded originally upon a genu ine sentiment of courtesy and gallantry to its legical extreme, opened the eyes of the community at last to its dangers and its absurdity. Poindexter, as he Bays, became the first victim of the re vulsion in sentiment, but that revulsion was the immediate consequence of his own aot, and he is rightly punished in order to prevent others from making the same mistake about the 'duties' of a gentleman. Of course he regrets the consequences of his deed, but this regret cannot restore his victim to life, while his sentence and punishment may save the lives of a good many young men in Virginia who are much too good to be shot down and slain as Curtis was. i'1 Bronson Howard, the American play writer, says that during his reoenttripiin England he observed that among the gentlemen of that country the habit of profanity has gone almost entirely out of use, and thinks the men this side the Atlantio might profitably follow their example. The first and worst of all frauds is to cheat oneself. All sin is easy after that. FACTS AM) FACIES. The newest thing in socks a baby. There are 4000 women postmasters' in the United States, and the number is on the increase. Instead of calling your silver-haired friend an old dog, why not hail him as a gray-hound ? The difference between a woman and a butcher is that one dresses to kill and the other kills to dress. An autograph letter of Henry Clay has been published iu which he returns thanks for a pair of knit socks. Pome wine bottled A. D. '79 will be opened on the coming 1800th anniver sary of the destruction of Pompeii. I want to be a coachman, And with the coachmen stand, And win the boss' daughter. And drive my fonr-in-hand. Count Johannes, the erratic lawyer actor, recovered a verdict of six cents in a libel suit against the Jersey City Journal. A young man who has recently taken a wife says he did not find it half so hard to get married as he did to get furniture. A singular scene is reported from Sumter county, Ga., where a man was discovered drawing a plow which his wife handled. Old Gentleman : Waiter, how's this ? These potatoes are quite hard I Waiter (with presence of mind): Hard times. you know, sir. A lonely Philadelphia widower, who buried his wife six weeks ago, refused a chew of light tobacco because he is still in full mourning. The consumption of opium is on the increase in the United States, and phy sicians claim its evil effects are becom ing very apparent. Gov. Robinson, of New York, is pro bably the oldest man in the conntry oc cupying the gubernatorial chair, being eighty-one years of age. It is estimated that the value of the straw hats and bonnets manufactured iu New England every year is from $15. 000,000 to $20,000,000. Thompson ssys you may talk of your water cures, your movement cures, and your blue-glass cures, but there is noth ing like the sinecure, after all. " An elephant died recently in Calcutta which is said to have been ridden by Warren Hastings when Governor Gan eral of India, a hundred years ago. No matter how many of our ladoned ships may come safely into port, that one which was lost at sea will always seem to us to have carried the richest cargo. Senator Conkling disapproved of the choice of his daughter Bassio.and would not appear at the wedding. Ex-Gov. Horatio Seymour, the bride's uncle.gave her away. There's no use in heaving old boots and shoes over the line fence into your neighbor's garden. They won't grow. .It has often been tried and always prov ed a failure. The nights are at hand when the young man cau stroll out with his fair Molindu and tell her more lies in a given time than any machine Edisou could get up for that purpose. The picnio time approaches when man relapses into barbarism and goes forth into the forest to devour hia food with a mixture of red ants, decayed wood and gravel. "The moon is always just the Bame," he said, languidly, "and yet I always find some new beauty in it." "It's just so with the cirous," she answered. He took the hint, and bought tickets for two. The average city man who makes an onion bed all himself in his backyard displays more vanity in sitting on the rear steps and overlooking his handi work thun does his fashionable wife in her parades before the mirror. We repeat with great earnestness, says the New York Observer, 'that we do not return manuscripts which are not accepted. The best way for a wri ter who wishes to keep his copy is not to send it Then he is sure of it.' Oh maiden sweet, with pretty feet, Tripping the fair fields over, For what do yon look by the babbling brook And amidst the dewy clover? Mister,' said she, 'yon don't know beani ; I'm gathering yellow dock for greens.' A short time ago a Danbury man had forty dollars stolen from him. The thief was subsequently struct with remorse, and sent back; twenty dollars, with a note to the effect that as soon as he re ceived more remorse he would send back the rest. Will you try some of my sponge cake, Mrs. Tattlotongue?' said she; 'it isn't very good, to be sure. I never had such poor luck in my life as I did in making it.' 'Why, mar cried Johnny, in amaze ment; 'you said yesterday that was the best sponge cake you ever madel' Tableau.
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers