SOME NEW BOOKS.
Reading edition
TRACK ATHLETICS IN DETAIL.
Compiled by the Editor of "Interscholastic Sport" in Harper's Round Table. Illustrated by Instantaneous Photographs. 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1.25. In "Harper's Round Table Library of Sports."
Each chapter of this book treats of a different event of track and field athletics, and is illustrated by instantaneous photographs of the leading athletes of America. These pictures show the detail of the work for each event, and the text gives instruction and advice which will prove most valuable not only to athletes who cannot avail themselves of the services of a trainer, but to more experienced performers as well. In an appendix are given the A. A. U. rules and tables of amateur, inter-collegiate, and interscholastic records.
FOR KING OR COUNTRY.
A Story of the American Revolution. By James Barnes. Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1.50.
A boy's story, full of movement, and full of surprises.... The picture of the old "Sugar House" prison in New York and of the secret societies of patriots are drawn with entertaining pen, and the book will instruct as well as interest the average boy who reads it.—Boston Journal.
TOMMY TODDLES.
By Albert Lee. Illustrated by Peter S. Newell. Square 16mo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1.25.
There is plenty of droll fun in this book.... We pity the person who can refuse to grin at some of the jocund surprises, sprung like steel traps by the story's comical turns, preposterous as it is.—Independent, N. Y.
HARPER & BROTHERS, Publishers, New York.
WAITING FOR THE BOAT.
ON A RAINY DAY.
"Mamma," said little Herbert, the other day, "what good are my rubber boots, anyhow?"
"Why, to keep your feet dry when you go out in the rain."
"If that is so, mamma," said little Herbert, triumphantly, "may I go out now and play in the rain?"
"No; I am afraid you will catch croup."
"What, mamma dear, with my rubber boots on?"
"Yes, Herbert, with your boots on."
"Then I can't see what good the rubber-boots are," protested Herbert.
"They're to wear that you may keep on the safe side. On the safe side of your health."
"Mamma," asked Herbert, "I don't want to appear rude or impertinent, but has my health really a safe side?"
"It has."
"Which side is it, mamma, the inside or the outside?"
Here Herbert's mother, entirely out of patience, looked into the fire.
"Mamma," said Herbert, presently, "you keep me in the house when I'm naughty, don't you?"
"Yes."
"And when I'm good you don't let me go out. Now what's the use in being good?"
"Sometimes you get a piece of cake for it."
"I forgot all about that, mamma. Now I'm going to be good all the time; then, I suppose, I can live on cake."
"That would make you sick."
"Then it would be as bad as playing in the rain. No, it wouldn't, either; it would be a great deal better. Can I have a piece of cake now, mamma?"
"Yes, if you'll keep still."
He agreed, and when he got the piece of cake he became so absorbed in it while absorbing it that he could not only not ask questions, but actually couldn't answer any.
JUST THE SAME.
Tommy. "Baby Indians must be just like baby geese, mamma."
Mamma. "Why so?"
Tommy. "Why, because the down on their heads all turns into feathers when they grow up."
IMPORTANT ANATOMICAL INFORMATION.
The Junior League is a paper "published semi-occasionally, or whenever it is convenient, by children, for children, in aid of children." In the May issue are printed a number of articles that took prizes in a recent story competition, and from among these we copy the following essay on "Bones," which took the prize in Class V.:
"Bones is the framework of the body. If I had no bones in me I should not have so much shape as I have now. If I had no bones in me I should not have so much motion, and teacher would be pleased, but I like to have motion. Bones give me motion, because they are sometimes hard for motion to cling to. If I had no bones, my brains, lungs, heart, and larger blood-vessels would be lying around in me and might get hurt, but now my bones get hurt, but not much unless it is a hard hit.
"If my bones were burned, I should be brittle, because it would take the animal out of me. If I was soaked in acid, I should be limber. Teacher showed me a bone that had been soaked; I could bend it easily. I should rather be soaked than burned. Some of my bones don't grow close to my others snug, like the branches to the trunk of a tree, and I am glad they don't, for if they did, I could not play leap-frog and other good games that I know. The reason why they don't grow that way is because they have joints. Joints is good things to have in bones. They are two kinds. The ball and socket joint like my shoulders is the best. Teacher showed it to me only it was the thigh of a cow. One end was round and smooth and whitish. That is the ball end. The other end was hollowed in deep. That is the socket and it oils itself. It is the only machine that oils itself. It never creaks like the school door. There is another joint that doesn't seem much like a joint. That is the skull. It don't have no motion. All my bones put together make a skeleton. If I leave out any or put any in the wrong place it ain't no skeleton. Some animals have their skeletons on the outside. I am glad I ain't them animals for my skeleton like it is on the chart wouldn't look well on my outside."
INCONSISTENT.
"I saw a funny thing to-day," Said little Arabella; "A man was walking in the rain Beneath a sun-umbrella."
A DOG-DAY QUERY.
"Mamma," said little Jimmy the other day, "if a dog's bark is worse than his bite, why don't they choke him off with a collar instead of putting a muzzle on him?"
THE ROUND YEAR.
Mamma. "Can you tell me how many seasons there are, Herbert?"
Herbert. "Yes, mamma, there are four—kite, skating, baseball, and football."