Afe! Who Can Tell t Ah! who nan tall what waits as whan the vail • That hides that other life is rolled away? Beyond its bounds mysterious, what dreads assail? ' What lies within its siiadows, who can say? What waits ns there Beyond our sight? Hope or dsspair, Or day or night? Whence flies the soul when it easts off the clay? Ah I who can tell? Oar loved ones die; throngh mists of blind ing tears In deepest gloom despairingly ws grope; Forebodingly we see the lonely years Unlighted by their love, unoheered by hope. Ah! who can tell? Where are our dead? Will all be well When life is fled? Ovarii they "our path o'er life's descending slope? Ah! who can tell? We <ee the ccremental winding-sheet. The toB of solemn funeral bell we hear; The last sad riles are paid, and grief com plete FUN all the heart with desolation drear. The somber pall, The lonely hearth, Can this be all There is of earth? Jbcls life with coffin, shroud and funeral bier? Ah! who can tell? A'en while we weep, .the tears that ease the heart In rays prismatic paint th' o'erhanging skiee, And u new hope, of our great grief a part, tu faith prophetic to the doubt repiee: " Bodies must die— Death is their goal, lowly they lie— Not so the son!; tfod keepetb that with ever-watchful eyes-- All will be well! ■r sorrow proved, made pure by trials here, The chastened heart looks upward for relief, And holds in spirit that communion dear Which is tliei well-spring of this sweet belief— After the strife Ctwneth a rest, Eternal life— Forever blest. Hie *oul Re gathers homo, a precious sheaf, All is well. —Frank .V. Scott. The Yellow Satin Dress. *• A very pretty girl!" said Mr. Alonro Fitxalpine, languidly biting the •arved top of his cane. " Nice com plexion. Figure like the Venus di— what's her name? Do make some ox en- to send her in again, madame!" M.'ulame Fontani laughed indul gently. Miss Fitzalpine was buying a white fece tunic, over canary-colored glace. Mrs. FitzaJpine had just ordered a gar net velvet, with carte-blanrhe as to point-lace trimming. And if the son •nil heir of this wealthy family be thought himself to behave like a Cir cassian prince surveying eligible young maidens for the market—well, young men would be young men, everybody knew that; and it would not do to dis oblige the Fitaalpines! ** Flora," she said, hurrying out to the little reception-room, where Flora Hottingbam, with blazing cheeks, was linging costly lac© draperies into the tcep drawers, " I've forgotten this wj>o Take it to Miss Fitzalpine, and •ell her I think it matches her dross setter than—" But instead of meekly obeying j 1 nadame's behests, Flora Nottingham | < lan ont of the room, and never stopped i Until she had hidden her hnrning face [ i the curtains of the back work room. " flood gracious me!" said Bella j Brown. " What's the matter?" "Such a horrid young manP ex-; plained Flora "He stared at me! ; And madarne wanted me to go hack again into the room, but I wouldn't." " HurnphP said Bella Brown. " I'd he glad enough to get into the show room. no matter if the customers •tared their eyes out at me." But Madame Fontani wits cross and curt with poor Flora after this all the afternoon. " I don't believe in such a parade of feminine modesty," said madame, shak ing her false curls. " But," pleaded Flora, piteousiy, "lie looked at me so insolently—just as if I were one of the show-figures !" " Well, what else are you ?" said Madame Fontani, sharply. " I can't have any young women so exceedingly high-toned that they'll have to lie put 'wader glass Rhades. If they can't hold themselves ready to oley orders, they m*j leave the establishment. Here. Miss Nottingham—this yellow satin Areas ranst be finished for to-morrow Morning at 9. Take it home with you to-night. I dare say, if you are steady 1 at it, you can finish it by 12." " But, madarne," cried Flora, •• i don't think it's possible to—" " Hush P whispered Bella Brown. ~ i ll help you." For Flora Nottingham and the dashing Miss Brown boarded together, in a tall, red-brick house, whert* a spare landlady, with a ted nose and faded alpaca raiment, charged them a mod' ra. • price in consideration of having the dresses of herself and her daughters fitted •<in real Broadway style." " It's so good of you, Bella, to assist me with this dress!" said Flora, grate fully. us the two Hut together, stitch ing away by the light of a shaded lamp. " I should have had to sit up all night to finish it myself." " Oh, don't mention it!" said Bella, good-humoredly. " I never did be lieve in deserting a friend at a pineh. See here, Flora—what's the matter? You are as white as a sheet !" " My head does ache dreadfully to night," admitted Flora, passing her hand vaguely across her forehead. " Well, then, go to bed," coaxed Bella. " Have a good night's rest. I'll finish the new satin dress. After all, there isn't so very much to do to it." " Oh, Bella dear Bella!" exclaimed grateful Flora. " How shall I ever thank you for this kindness? Because, indeed, I am very, very tired!" " Oil, you ran do as much for me some time!" said Bella Brown, gra ciously. And so Flora crept into bed, falling asleep almost as soon as her head touched the pillow. At ten o'clock Miss Bella Brown rose cheerfully up, " did " her hair after the latest fashion-plate style, and dressed herself in the very yellow satin dress, with its ivory-white " tunic front," which she had just finished, and went to a ball with a tailor's clerk of her acquaintance. This was by no means a novel idea of Miss Brown's. She had often done it before. "It don't hurt the dresses just to wear them, carefully, once," said Bella. " Itirh people haven't any right to ex pect all the cream of life just because they are rieh. We poor, down-trodden sewing-girls must have some little chance. Anil this yellow dress is such a beauty, exactly the color of a Mare chal Neil rose!" Could the liellcs of Fifth avenue and the languid queens of Japonica square but have known the atmosphere through which their dresses had been trailed before coming home in folds of silver paper and boxes labeled " Modes de Paris!" When Bella Brown railed her in the morning, Flora Nottingham rubbed her heavy eyelids. " Do you know. Bella," said she, " 1 had such a strange, strange dream, in the middle of the night? I thought you were standing here, and dressed in the yellow satin rolie." Bella laughed a sharp, affected laugh. '• What nonsense, child!" said she. "Be quick and drives. It's late al rrady. And the robe is all foldid up in the box, ready to carry to the store." Flora Nottingham need not have been in such haste, as it transpired. Mrs. Dr. Truefitt did not call for the dress until nearly noon, and then her husband was with her. "Make haste, Madame Fontani," she cried. " The doctor declares he liasn't more than five minutes to spare, and I want him to see this lovely dress!" Mrs. Truefitt was a dark, sparkling little brunette, and yellow was her darling color. The doctor looked down upon her with mild, benignant eyes. " All her dresses are lovely for the first month," said he, laughing. " And then they become odious." Madame Fontani, all smiles, like a venerable specimen of the " Cheshire cat " we read of, lost no time in dis playing the yellow dress on one of her chintz-draped dummy figures. " There, I)r. Truefitt I" said she, " I think that is- - Dear, dear ! what ran possibly have happened to it? Miss Nottingham, come here this instant 1" Mrs. Truefitt uttered a little cry of dismay, for there, on the very front , breadth, was a dull, dim stain—the glass of wine that the tailor's clerk had spilled there the night before, and whose traces Miss Bella Brown had vainly endeavored to remove. Flora stood aghast lieforn it. "Nottingham, it's your fault!" sereamed Madame Fontani. "The dress was in perfect order when it was intrusted to your hands last night! You alone are responsible—you alone ! What have you to say?" "I know nothing about it, madams, faintly gasped Flora, turning as pale as ashes, and Instinctively glancing | toward Bella Brown, who, with un | natural red cheeks, was stooping over ' some satin trimmingn in a corner. Just then I)r. Truefitt's groom, a nat. tily-attired youth of two or three and twenty, in a velvet-handed hat and livery of sober black, who came up to get the parcel while the coachman sat on the box below, stepped forward and touched his hat. " Might I speak, sir?" said he. " Be cause I've seen this 'ere gown afore- It was wore at. the Ciceronle Clerks' Association Fall, where I was lat night, and f had the honor of duneln with that there young woman in thi corner" nodding Ids lead at I'd'* Brown "as had it on. And bet young man keeled over a glass o| Widow Clickett champagne on it a* supper, and there was a first-class row about it." "Oh, Bella! oh, Bella!" ojpsl Flori Nottingham, reproachfully; "then my dream was true, after all." And Bella Brown burst into tears, and uttered never a word of self-de fense. Madame Fontuni discharged her within the next half hour. "Such assurance I never saw!" said the indignant modiste. "As if my customers' elegant, orders were to )>e ruined at her balls and hops, and low class things. And she may thank her stars, I|don't have her arrested and flung into jail!" While poor Flora stood by, with such an expression of white, mute dismay on her face, that Mrs. Truefltt turned kindly to her. " My dear," said she, in a low voice, "you are not happy here?" " Oh, no, no!" cried Flora, wringing her hands. " Isn't the woman kind to you?" <iuestiunl the doctor's wife. " No," murmured Flora. " Don't they pay you well?" " Not very." " In that case," said Madaino Fon tani, turning suddenly on her appalled workwoman, "you, too, had better leave my service, Miss Nottingham. I'm sure I beg your pardon, Mrs. Truefltt; but if you could but know the laziness, the treachery and the in gratitude of the creatures that I have to deal with—" " Pray don't excite yourself," inter posed Mrs. TruefHt, cohlly. " Here is my address, child," scribbling a few words on a leaf of her note-lmok and handing it to Flora. " Come to me this afternoon, and we will see what can be done." And so she went away, leaving the yellow satin dress on Madame Fonta ni's hands. " Don't come to me for a recommen dation," said the dressmaker, in a blind rage. And Flora didn't. But that is how Flora Nottingham came to leave the great, grinding city, where the poor are borne down to the very ground, and go to Mrs. Truefltt's aunt, a smiling, kindly old lady, who kept a fanry store in one of the sev eral New England villages where double rows of maples shaded the streets, and the scent of the honey suckle fills the air. To the joor child this atmosphere of j>eace and quietness was like a foretaste of heaven itself. And old Miss lledgeley was equally pleased with her new shop-girl. " My dear," she said to Flora one evening, after half an hour's medita tion in the purple July twilight, "do you know what 1 am thinking of?" "No, Miss lledgeley," said the girl, laughing. "Of adopting you, Flora, as my own child." "Oh, Miss lledgeley I" faltered Flora. "If you don't marry, 1 mean," the old lady corrected herself. Flora blushed a bright soft pink. " I shall never marry,' Miss Hedge" ley," said she. " I am not so sure almut that," said Miss lledgeley, as she thought of tho number of visits that Mr. Paltison, the new minister, had considered It necessary to make at her domicile of late. •• But anyhow, my dear, I hope you won't go away very far from me." And out of the fullness of her heart Flora speaks : "Oh, Mihs lledgeley, I never knew what true happiness was until I knew you."— Helen Forrtat Fantastic Extravagance. Warsaw society is still excited over an exhibition of fantastic extravagance with which a number of Russian offi cers have recently entertained them selves. AdjutiUit-fJeneral Count Pillar and Prince Mijanowier., of the Hus sars, conceived the idea of a Roman luinqtict in the style of Liicullus, aqjl twenty-six other oflleers united in the novel diversion. The hanqunt-hall was filled with rones and perfumed with all ths odors of Arabia, and the feastern arrayed themselves in Roman togas and wore garlands of roses on their beads. Hwallows' nests from India, wild African pigeons and a ragout of nightingales were among the costly viands with which they were served, The banquet lasted eight hours and cost 921,000, or $750 apiece. This gas. tronomical extravagance has provoked bitter criticism In Warsaw, where It is denounced as a wicked imitation of tho wanton luxury which preceded the fall of the Roman empire, and where It has, at least, dime nothing to make I more agreeable the relations existing lietwmi the Polish imputation and th ; 11 lissom garrison. MORAL A*l> RELIGIOUS. I .Win || to Pur Jtr>nf. " Liv c f >r some purpose in tin' world. Act your part well. Fill up the meas ure of your duty to others. Conduct yourself mi that you shall he missed with sorrow when you are gone. Multitudes of your species are living in such a selfish manner that they are not likely to he remembered after their disappearance. They leave behind them scarcely any trace of their exist ence, but are forgotten almost as though they had not been. They are, while they live, like ono pebble lying unobserved among a million on the shore; .and when they die, they are like the same pebble thrown into the sea, which just rufTles flic surface, sinks and is forgotten, without being missed from the beach. They are neither regretted by the rich, wanted by the poor nor celebrated by the learned. Who has been the better for their life? Who lias been the worse ,for their death? Whose tears have 'they dried up? Whose wants sup plied? Whose miseries have they jhealod? Who would unbar the gates of life to readmit them to existence? Or what face would greet them b;u k again to our word with a smile? 'Wretched, unproductive mode of exists ence ! Selfishness is its own curse; it is a starving vire. The man who does no good, gets none, lie is like the heath in the desert, neither yielding fruit nor seeing when good comet.li; a stunted, dwarfish, miserable shrub." - J. A. Janus. ll<liloun Nrw and Notes. The ftouthmi Hnptiat says there are .about 125,000 Baptists in Mississippi, of which 100,0(10 arc whites and 25,- 000 colored. The woman's foreign missionary so. ciety of the Methodist Episcopal church was organized in March, 1809, in Tremont street church, Boston. Since then its total receipts have been $098,915, and it has sent out sixty three missionaries. There were added to the Southern I'rcubyterian churches in the year end ing May last on profession of faith 0,062 persons, an advance of more than 1,200 over the previous year. There are 6,000 elders and 4,000 deacons in the church. A sjiecial convention of the Protest ant Episcopal diocese of Central Penn sylvania w ill moot at Beading in Octo ber for the purp<se of electing an assistant bishop. The recently organized Church Ex tension society of the Methodist Epis copal church, South, has resolved to ask of the annual conferences $50,000 for the ensuing year. Crathie Established church, whic.li Is attended by the queen when in Scotland, it would seem, is not distin guished for the liberality of its mem bers, the whole contributions to the mission and other schemes of the churli amounting last year to 1100. and the total income to $505. Among the Primitive Methodists of England a barn-service revival is grow ing apace. In one very small parish, where tho Primitives have no chapel, a week's service was held in a large barn, and as a result the whole region has lieen aroused, and over seventy persons have professed conversion. A Nstnral Copper Plating Bath. Two years ago, at a mine operated by William Utter, at Campo Seeo, near Klilton, water came in and work flopped. To keep the large iron-ltound and iron-haled bueket, used to hoist rock, from drying and falling to pieces. It was let down into the water. Next season when it was drawn up, 10, a miracle! It was copper-bound and copper-bailed. From this has sprung quite an industry, and tho mine lots been sustaining itself from ore water ever since. The water contains an acid which has the propriety of taking into solution the particles of iron thrust into it, and it has also copper in solution which is let go, particle by particle, as the iron is picked up. It is an extreme ly simple chemical exchange, and this mine may make another profit still if it will get another chemical into the water which will make the mid lay down the iron which, as a black flood, the water carries down into the Stanis laus river. The oopper industry con sists in taking bundles of scrap iron and ok! tin to the mine, where it is thrust into vats of water caught up. (n which the metals are soon changed to copper, the residue of the iron taking the form of a black stream and flowing away. To make suro of making the water swap all Its copper for Iron, which it Is glad to do without hoot, one Vat is placed below another down the Ibatdt to the river, and when the water escapes it has eaten its fill of iron and left pay for Its meal in genuine copper -Stockton (CaL) Mail. WhQ th funds arc unsteady— When money is ti^ht. Curious Fart* About the Mormon*. It will sound strangely in the cart of tli.' people in " Mi'* St at on," and yd it is an actual fart, nay* a correspond ent, writing from Salt Lake City, that there in not a common or froo ttchooi in the Territory. In the city of Salt Lake and at otiier point* there ar< schools where pupil* of all den om in a ' tioiis are admitted, hut a small tuition 1 fee i* cJmrged. The t earlier* are all Mormon, and the, exercises every day begin and end with reading frotn the Hook of Mormon*. The Cent ilea, I riee.l hardly say, do not care to wend their children to these dent "I fanati cism, and latte.rly they have e*tabli*lied a few schools of their own, but they arc all sectarian the Catholics have one, the episcopalian* an other, the Methodists another, and so on. If it he true that, common schools are essential to a republican form of government, then Utah has not a republican form of government, 1 and it is about the only Territory ' which has not, and the want of com mon schools is by no means the only evidence of this fact. What is called the "perpetual emigration fund" is one of the chief agencies in keeping up and increasing the numerical strength of the church. It is estimated that ;1,000 people are brought from Europe every year through this instru mentality. There are agencies of the fund in New York, Liverpool and the principal cities of Denmark, Sweden and other countries likely to furnish recruits for the grand army of fanaticism. Missionaries are sent abroad every year to solicit enlistments. The emi grant is furnished with transportation across the water and across the plains, and when he arrives here he is settled on a small farm—about ten acres is the average, I believe. JIo gives his note for the grand total at ten per cent, per annum. This note is hardly, ever collected, because it is almost im-< possible for the emigrant to pay it off after settling with the tithing master twice a year and complying with the numerous exactions of the church in other respect*. it is held simply as a mortgage upon the man and his family, the non-enforcement of which is conditionod upon his " good behavior" to the church. If he chance to fall into disfavor with the hierarchy his lot is a hard one. He finds himself without home or friends. He cannot go back whence he came— there is no fund for that purpose—and to star where he is is the worst kind of slow torture. The emigrants are carefully instructed upon their arrival here that their first allegiance is doe to the church, and their second and only other al'giance to the authorities of the Territory. A Field of flattie. I had my letter to write and post, and this invited a five-mile drive by moonlight to the rear arrow the most ghastly field which ran well be Im agined. I had omc trouble in finding my carriage. I had left it at a well defined position on the battle of the day before, but to reach it I had to walk for more than a mileoveT a plain where the carrassoe of men and horses were not merely thickly strewn but frozen imto all sorts of fantastic at titudes. The thermometer had b<en sixteen degrees below the freezing point on the previous night, and men only slightly wounded, who had not been able to crawl to their comrades, had been frozen to death. One man was stiff in a sitting position, with both arms lifted straight at-ove his head, as though his last moments had leen spent in an invocation, and it gave one a shudder in the clear moon light to approach him. Others were crumpled up in a death agony, and so frozen. In places, many together, French and Germans were mingled, not because they had been at close quarters, but because the same ground had first been occupied by one and then by the other, perhaps at an interval of half a day. I think I was more com fortable with bullets singing in my cars than walking amid the distorted shadows of these dead and stiffened men; and it w-as quite a relief to see a haystack on fire and a regiment warming themselves at it, and my prudent coachman within comfortahle distance of the ruddy blaze. Then cornea tho hard part of a correspond ent's Ufa. I had still to dins. 1 had lived sines the morning's coffee on a loaf of bread which 1 had been picking at all day ; then to write my letter—a good two hours task ; then to see that it was safely posted, either that night or the next morning early, so aa to give roe time to get to the field for the third days' battle. And all this after having lawn on a strain of exertion and excitement since daylight; and then the gentleman at eaae in London reads It all in hia arm-chair after break fast for a penny or at the most two pence half-penny.— Markuwxf* Mog,i iiuti Ashes of Rose*. A fair bias see, where mirrored lis The gold-brown rock in sunshine restlag, The changeful giory of the sky, The white-wing'd gall his swift w*j hr*t ing— A world of light end song sad bloom Where earth is glad and heaven r*/, And, floating through my quiet room, A laughing chime of hairy voice". Half way across the seaward slope With ball green grasses I rending ovr, Two sweet eyes bright with love and ho;* (>engh ap at me among the clover With flatter of a little gown Whose flying fold the wind upraise* Her pretty hear! of gohlcn brown My darling lifts auud the daisies. Tart of the shining day she seem", Hut more divine than all its splend-.r. Like some fair light that shines in d-'smi, Ho softly bright, so sweetly tender The glow upon the rounded cheek, Tire Imping voice in broken "weetnr-. More life and love and joy lresj*r,k Than all the summer's rich cornph >r... And yet-—rtlaa! the woful chance That comes to dim the moment's f-n a- The sparkling eye, the sj>eaking glan-> The bea(MMl-up wealth of Jons • -MI treasure, Do but recall a vanished hliiw, As Memory's haul the curtain rn: Another head, sr. fair as tins, That lies below the residing daiie —Ma ry A . I PCSCJEJTT PARAGRAPHS. A Boston in din calls hi* wife < tal, because &he is always or u watch. A woman has to settle a man'* "f. fee with the white of an egg, can sHt!o his hash with a look. When a inan prefaces his eon • • v tion with " Now, I know it inn • >:,j of my business," you may fx- JWI sure that it isn't. " Great pains taken'' is the h< > ? of an advertisement in one *,f dailh*. Probably some gentlema' •, eaten a whole watermelon. "Mr. !>., if you'll get my coat by Saturday, I shall l*i forever in debtod to you." "If that's your pv- It won't bo done," Baid the tailor. A Missouri girl whose father rely* to buy a lemon-colored linen dres poi soned one of his mules to get even. * girl who can't be in style will bf* desperate. ' A New York physician gives haif dozen reasons why Americans pr * bald. It ap]H-ars that the prim pal reason is because their hair comes ' We always suspected as much. An intelligent farmer being ask ;f his horses were well matched, replied "Yes, they are matched first rate; one of them is willing to do all the work and the other is willing that he shm.M " A Brooklyn boy wrote a compost ion on the subert of the Quakers, whom he described as a sect who never quar reled, never got into a fight, n<ver clawed each other and never j*d back. The production contained \ postacript in these words: " Pa's * Quaker, but ma isn't." For a little lady of two-and-a-'ialf years old this will do: She had picked up a oane in the corner of the room, and was playing with it—a plain suck bent at the end. Papa asked: " Wl*. are you doing with the cane T "It Isn't a cane." " What is it, tb< n** ! " It's an umbrella without any cloihw cm." The policeman saw the mob vu Wind to wreck the building, and his own unaided efforts oould not Net them off. But he had the presence <i mind to run around the corner asd yell " dog fight," and in ten second' there wasn't a man in the crowd who wasn't hnstling around to find th* dogs. " But why did you leave her sn hastily?" asked a sympatiiing friend who was trying to console a lover fv his separation from the object of his idolatry. " Oh, it vas a sudden im pulse." " What sort of an impulse ~ " I don't know exactly," returned the sufferer, thoughtfully, "but it mutf have been at least a No. 12," i ; lie sat at bar feet in quiet peace- He looked into her face ami said, soft!' *' Ah, door, I could sit here forever" w ' Could you, love?" answered she. " Yes, sweet." "Yon are right rare you could, darling?" * I know It,? own." •• Very well. then, you s there, for I have an engagement te f out with young Mr. Fitrponner, and 1 won't be hack this evening. Tnrti down the gas and fasten the nifM latch when yon go away." t Baid a singer to a/armer: " I would like to engage board with you fsr month." The husbandman looked at hu> a moment, then asked: " What do you jdo for a livingr "Oh I sing in aehurrh ichoir in the city." " You do, eh! Wd! jyou can't board with me." " Why not?" gasped the wondering warW. " 'Cause," replied the soil-tiller,. - Ike hut fellow who boarded with tai a singer, and he had such a tbuJl- rmc bass voice that every Ume he d| all the milk In the cellar turne2*ir *
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers