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so, to compromise the matter, she pretended to be taken with a fit of coughing. Josh felt his heart begin to beat, and was fully convinced he was courting or something very like it; but what to do next was the question. "Shall I kiss her," thought he. "No, no, it's a leetle too early for that; but I'll tell her I love her." At this thought his heart went bump! bump! bump! harder than ever. Hannah," he exclaimed in a squeaking voice, and stopped short. Hey! Josh," said Hannah. 'Hannah, I I "he rolled up the whites of his eyes in a most supplicating leer, but the word stuck in his throat. Hannah looked directly in his face; he was in a dreadful puzzle what to say, for he was obliged to say something. His eye fell by accident on a gridiron hanging in the chimney corner, "What a terrible crack your gridiron's got in it!" exclaimed he. "Poh," said Hannah.

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Here the conversation came again to a dead stop, for Josh had so exhausted himself in this effort to break the ice, that he was not master of his faculties for several minutes; and when he fairly came to his senses, he found himself counting the tickings of an old wooden clock that stood in the corner. He counted and counted till he numbered three hundred and ninety-seven ticks, when he luckily heard a cow lowing out of doors.

dromedary!"

No,---did you Josh?

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Hannah," asked he, "did you ever see a

"No," returned Josh, "I never see nothin' in my life but a green monkey; and then I was a'most skeered to death !"

"Lawful heart! Mercy's sake!" exclaimed Hannah, and here the conversa. tion came to a pause again.

The longer they sat, the more awkwardly Josh found himself situated; he sat bolt upright in his chair, with his knees close together and his head stooping forward in such a manner that his long queue stuck out horizontally behind, and his eyes horizontally before, like those of a lobster. For several minutes he sat contemplating the handle of the warming-pan that hung by the side of the fire-place; and then gradually elevating his line of vision, came in sight of a huge crook-necked squash lying on the mantel-piece. Then he looked at Hannah, and then at the dish-cloth in the mouth of the oven, and from the dishcloth made a transition back to the warming-pan. "Courting," thought Josh, "is awful hard work." The perspiration stood on his forehead, and his eel-skin queue pulled so tight that he began to fear the top of his head was coming off; but not a word could he say. And just at that moment a green stick of wood upon the fire began to sing in a dismal tone, " Que, que, que, que, que.” Nothing frets the nerves more when a body is a little fidgetty, than the singing and sputtering of a stick of wood. Josh felt worse than ever, but the stick kept on, que, que, que, quiddle de dee, que, que, quiddledy, quiddledy, que, que, que,-Josh caught up the tongs and gave the fire a tremendous poke. This exertion somewhat relieved him.

"Hannah" said he, hitching his chair a yard nearer.

"Well, Josh."

Now, thought Josh, I will tell her I love her.- -"Hannah,” said he again,

"I"-He stared so wildly and made such a horrible grimace that Hannah Hannah, I say," repeated he-but here again his

bounced from her chair. 66 courage failed him.

"What say, Josh ?"

"I- I it's a grand time for turnips. Ugh ugh ugh!" "Poh!" returned Hannah. "Let alone of my apron-string, you Josh." Josh sat in silence and despair for some time longer, growing more and more nervous every moment. Presently the stick of wood burst out squeaking again in the most doleful style imaginable, Quiddledy, quiddledy quee---ee---ee——— iddledy, que, que quiddledy quidbledy que que que-ee-ee-ee-ee—ee— Josh could not bear it any longer, for he verily believed his skull-bone was splitting. "I swaggers," he exclaimed "this is too bad!"

"What's the matter, Josh?" asked Hannah in considerable alarm. "Suthin' ails me," said Josh.

"Dear me !" exclaimed Hannah, sha' n't I get you a mug of cider ?" "Do,” replied Josh, “for I don't feel as I used to did."

Hannah ran down cellar and returned with a quart mug of cider. Josh put it to his lips and took a heavy pull. It was what the farmers call hard cider, and Josh verily feared his eyes would start out of his head while he was drinking it, but after several desperate gulps he succeeded in draining the mug. Then pulling a blue-and-white check handkerchief from his pocket, he rubbed his face very hard, and looked straight into the fire.

But in a few minutes he found his spirits wonderfully rising; he lifted up his eyes, hitched his chair nearer, sent Hannah a sly look, and actually gave a loud giggle. Hannah giggled in reply, for giggling, like gaping, is contagious. In two minutes more, his courage rose higher; he threw one of his long legs across the other, gave a grin, slapped his hand upon his knee, and exclaimed as bold as a lion,

d

“Hannah,—if a young feller was for to go to offer for to kiss you, what ye think ye should do?" Having uttered these words, he stopped short, his mouth wide open in gaping astonishment at his own temerity.

If Hannah did not blush, it was probably owing to her being at that moment engaged in blowing the fire at a desperate rate with an enormous pair of broken-winded bellows, which occupation had set her all in a blowze. She understood the hint, and replied,

"Guess ye 'd better not try, Josh."

Whether this was intended as a warning, or an invitation, never could be satisfactorily known. Josh did not stop to inquire, but he thought it too good a chance to be lost: "I'll kiss her! by Golly!" he exclaimed to himself. He made a bounce from his chair and seized the nozzle of the bellows, which Hannah was sticking at that moment under a huge iron pot over the fire. Now, in this pot were apples a stewing, and so it happened that Hannah, in the confusion occasioned by the visit of Josh, had made a mistake and put in sour apples instead of sweet ones : sour apples, when cooking, everybody knows, are apt to explode like bomb shells. Hannah had been puffing at the bellows with might and main, and raised the heat to a mischievous degree ;there was no safety valve in the pot-lid, and just as Josh was upon the point of snatching a kiss, whop! the whole contents of the pot went off in their faces !

At the same moment the door flew open, and the whole Downer family came in from meeting. Such a sight as they beheld! There stood Josh,

beplastered with apple-sauce from head to foot, and frightened worse than if he had seen a green monkey. Hannah made her escape, and left Josh to explain the catastrophe. He rolled up his eyes in utter dismay. "What is the matter?" exclaimed Peggy Downer. "Ugh! ugh! ugh!" replied Losh, and that was all he could say. "Goodness' sake! Josh Beanpole! is that you?" asked mother Downer, for Josh was so beplastered, beluted, and transubstantiated by the apple-sauce that she did not at first discover who it was."I d'n know—no n't I," said Josh.-"What a spot o' work!" exclaimed Peggy. Josh looked down at his pantaloons-"Oh! forever!" he exclaimed, "this beats the gineral trainin'!"

How matters were explained, and how Josh got safe home, I cannot stop to explain. As to the final result of the courtship, the reader may as well be informed that Josh had too much genuine Yankee resolution to be beaten away from his prize by a broadside of baked apples. In fact, it was but a few months afterwards, that Deacon Powderpost, the town clerk, was digging all alone in the middle of his ten-acre potato field, and spied Josh Beanpole looming up over the top of the hill. Josh looked all around the horizon, and finding no other living soul to be seen, came scrambling over the potato hills, and got right behind the Deacon, where in about a quarter of an hour he mustered courage sufficient to ask him to step aside, as he had a communication for his private ear. To make a long story short, Josh and Hannah were published the next Sunday.

THE ECLIPSE OF THE MOON.

TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL GERMAN OF JEAN PAUL VON RICHTER.

On the lily plains of the moon dwelt the mother of the human race, with all her innumerable daughters in calm unceasing affection. The azure sky which floats only distantly over the earth reposes there, and reclines on the snowy meadows of flower blossoms. No chilling cloud spreads a temporary twilight through the clear æther. No angry feeling corrodes the gentle souls. As the rainbows of a waterfall intermix, so does Love and Repose intertwine all into one embrace; and when in the tranquil night the earth hangs splendent and extended beneath the stars, the souls which have suffered and rejoiced upon it, gaze with sweet yearning recollection upon the abandoned spot, where beloved ones dwell yet, and where their own forsaken bodies repose; and if then the ponderous lulling earth dazzlingly approaches the closing eye, the former springs of earth pass before them again in brilliant dreams; and when their eyes unclose, they are filled with the morning dews of joyful tears.

But when the shadow index of eternity points to a new century, a burning pain flashes through the bosom of the mother of the human race, for the beloved daughters who have not yet been upon earth, leave the moon, and enter into their bodies so soon as the earth with its cold dense shadow, touches and overpowers them.

The mother of the human race weeping beholds their departure; for not all, but only the spotless, return to her in the pure moon. And as one century

after another takes some of her children from the bereaved mother, she trembles

in the day that she perceives our rapacious globe like a broad dense cloud approach the sun.

The index of eternity approached the 18th century, and the earth, filled with darkness, advanced towards the sun. The mother was pressing fervently and mournfully those of her daughters who had not worn the trappings of mortality to her bosom, and imploring them with tears, thus :--

"Oh, do not fall my beloved ones, remain

Pure as angels and return here again."

Now the giant shadow touched the century, and the opaque earth covered the whole sun. (The opaque earth completely veiled the sun.) A thunderclap struck the hour. In the murky heavens hung a flaming comet sword, the Milky Way shook, and a voice cried out from it, "Appear, tempter of mankind."

Every century the eternal sends an evil genius to tempt it.

Remote as an indissoluble nebula in the heavens, is the all-embracing everlasting scheme of the Deity from mortal eyes.* As the tempter was summoned, the mother of the human race with all her children trembled, and the gentle souls all wept, even the glorified ones who had already been on earth.

Now, together with the earth, a huge gigantic serpent reared itself and reached up to the moon, and cried, "I will corrupt you." It was the evil genius of the 18th century.

The lily bells of the moon collapsed, bowed their heads, and withered away. The comet sword swayed to and fro as the headman's sword waving by itself, as a sign that it will soon be put in execution.

The serpent insinuated itself into the peaceful Eden, with glittering eyes, with blood-red crest, with lips worn through with constant venomous biting and licking, and with a threatening tongue.

The tail moved convulsively; and as it were maliciously and greedily, in a grove upon the earth. An earthquake on our globe whirled the curling rings upwards, and the speckled poisonous liquid was scattered like a livid thunder cloud.

Alas, it was the black spirit who had formerly tempted the wretched mother of mankind. She could look upon him, but the serpent commenced thus: "Know'st thou not the serpent, Eve? I will tempt thy daughters, thy pure butterflies I will collect on the Morass. Behold, sisters, with what (things) I will allure you all;" and here the viper eyes reflected masculine forms; the coloured coils of his body, matrimonial rings; and the yellow scales represented pieces of gold money. "And for these I take you from the moon, and also from virtue. In the silken bonds of glittering stuffs, and in the wide meshes of the cunning loom will I ensnare you. my fire-crown I will attract you, and you shall desire to wear it. I will insinuate my flattery into your heart at first, and after I will instil my words into the tones of the masculine voice, and I will confirm and continue the effects; and in your tongues I will infuse my own, and make them keen and venomous; and then when all is gloomy around you, and at the near approach of death, then will I insert my fangs of fruitless remorse, sharply direct and burning into your hearts.

With

* A nebula is a solar system at such a vast distance in the firmament, that no telescope can distinguish any single star in it.

"Take an eternal leave of them Eve, for what I say to them here they will forget, happily for me, before they shall be born."

The unborn souls hid themselves trembling in each other, before the approaching cold poisonous vapour tree; and the souls which, pure as the exhalations of fragrant blossoms, had re-ascended from the earth, embraced each other in timid joy, and in the gentle trepidation of surmounted perils.

The most beloved daughter Maria, and the mother of the human race, held each other closely to their hearts; they knelt in this embrace and raised their supplicating eyes upwards, and the tears that flowed from them implored the All Merciful thus;

"Oh! do thou protect them!"

And behold, as the monster darted forth its long subtle cloven tongue, which, shaped as the lobster's claw, swept over the surface of the moon and snapped the lilies asunder; and whilst it was making a black spot on the moon, crying, "I will corrupt you," behold the first rays of the sun shot forth from behind the earth, and its golden light gleamed on the brow of a noble beautiful youth who had been unperceived amidst the trembling souls; a lily covered his heart, a wreath of rosebuds flourished on his brow, and azure as the celestial sky was his garment.

He looked down upon the mourning souls with glowing, beaming love, and in silent tears, as the sun upon the rainbow, and then said:

"I will protect you."

It was the genius of religion. The undulating great serpent became petrified before him, and stood congealed upon the earth against the moon, as a powder magazine, filled with incipient black death.*

And the sun cast a bright gleam on the youth's countenance, and he raised his large eyes to the stars and said to the Eternal;

"Father, I go with my sisters into mortal existence, and I will protect all who will receive me. Enshrine this ætherial flame in a beautiful temple. It shall not deform or destroy it. Adorn this beautiful soul with the foliage of earth's loveliest charms; it shall protect her fruits only, not overshadow them ; give it a beautiful eye, I will animate and master it; place a tender heart in its bosom, it shall not crumble into dust before it has throbbed for virtue and for thee; and unspotted and undecayed will I transform the flowers into fruit and bring them out of the earth again.

"For upon the mountains and up to the sun, and amongst the stars will I fly, and remind them of thee and of the world above the earth. Into the pure light of the moon will I change the lily of my breast, and into the evening glow of the spring evening will I change the rosebuds of my wreath, and thus remind them of their brother.

"In the tones of melodious music will I call them and speak to them of thy heaven, and open its portals before their harmonizing hearts. With the arms of their parents will I draw them to me, in the voice of poetry will I infuse mine; and with the traits of their much-beloved ones will I embellish my own features. Yea, even with the storm of suffering will I pass over them, and cast the lucid even into their eyes, and direct their gaze upwards to the heights, and towards the kindred from whence they spring.

* Black death has here a double signification, for there is a fatal disease called in Germany "black death."