replied Reed, as it set on the table, and you could have helped yourself if you wished." The Doctor paid the charge. On his return he put up at the same house, and on entering he noticed the decanter on the table, placed his saddle-bags by it, and helped himself liberally to its contents. After paying the usual charges the next morning, he informed the landlord that he had a bill of $5 against him for medicine. "Medicine! medicine!" answered Reed, "why, I have had no medicine." "Well, you might have had," replied the Doctor; "it was on the table, and you could have helped yourself if you wished it."

A GENTLEMAN in this city, who gives us his name and residence, writes to the Drawer:

While strolling through a small cemetery in the township of Ryegate, Vermont, I found the following quaint inscription upon a tombstone. Whether the poetry was composed by the recumbent I know not:

Then follows the stanza:

I lived on earth; I died on earth;
In earth I am interred;

All that have life are sure of death;
The rest may be inferred.

THE two following come from South Glastonbury, Connecticut:

In the old times when the patriarchal institution existed in the land of Connecticut there dwelt here two ancient Africans, who, in their old age, were pensioners of the family of a certain Captain Brooks, a West India trader. They had been brought from Guinea, but a long residence here had civilized and Christianized them to a degree that made them extremely useful and respected members of the community. "Old Shorey" was, at the time I speak of, full eighty years of age, and "Vi'let," his wife, not much less.

One day a neighbor, happening to visit their humble dwelling at the time of the noonday meal, paused at the door and heard the old man invoking a blessing on the meal, both parties standing, as was the custom in "the early times." The thanksgiving ran as follows:

"Sometimes de Lord send us good vittley; sometimes de Lord send us poor vittley. we tank de Lord when he send us any vittley. Sit down, Biley; eat you' dinner."

This truly thankful spirit was always displayed by "Old Shorey," in prosperity or adversity.

OCCASIONALLY his feelings broke out in exceed ingly grotesque displays, as, for instance, on the occasion of the return of his patron, Captain Brooks, from one of his voyages, under circumstances which made it a particularly joyful occasion to his family. "Vi'let," returning one evening from her daily labors, was amazed to see their abode lighted up with unwonted brilliance, and her astonishment became dismay to find, on entering, all the candles they possessed, three in number, blazing, or more probably sputtering, in the windows, and Old Shorey fiddling and dancing.

Why, Shorey," she exclaimed, what is come to you?"

"Massa Brooky come home!" was the exultant reply. "Massa Brooky got home, Biley, and I'se gwine to hab a numilation!”

A BEAUTIFUL specimen of conjugal affection was shown in a recent telegraphic correspondence. Mr. F. R was a prominent and leading public man in the western part of the State. He fell into ill health, and finally lost his reason, and was taken to the lunatic asylum. Declining still, he was byand-by so evidently dying that a dispatch was sent to his wife, saying, "If she wished to see him alive, to come immediately." To which she replied by telegraph, "If he gets any worse, let me know.” They sent her husband home dead in a day or two.

THE following is worth reading only as a specimen of the humor that our Far Western friends enjoy. It is a description of a marriage in the western part of the State of Wisconsin, taken verbatim from a letter written by Squire W, a newlyappointed justice of the peace. He says:

Justice of the Peace, I was accosted a few days after by a Having been appointed to the desirable "posish" of sleek-looking young man, and in silvery tones requested to proceed to a neighboring hotel, as he wished to enter into the holy bonds of matrimony. Here was a "squelcher." I had never done any thing of the kind; had no books, nor forms; and though having been married my self, yet having labored under great perturbation of mind upon that occasion, I did not recollect much about the ceremony. I however determined to do things up strong, and in a legal manner; so I proceeded to the hotel, bearing in my arms one copy Revised Statutes, one ditto Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, one copy large size Bible, a small copy of the creed and articles of faith of the Congregational Church, one copy of Pope's Essay on Man, and a sectional map of that part of the State where the victim lived. Having placed a table in the middle of the room, I in With that the young man trumpet tones called the case. and woman, with great alacrity, stepped up before me. Having sworn them upon the Bible, as I supposed (which afterward proved to have been the Dictionary), to answer well and truly all the questions I was about to ask, I proceeded. I told the young man that, being an entire stranger, I should have to ask him to give bail for the costs. Having heard this so frequently in Court, I thought it indispensable. He answered, if I meant the fee for perAs 1 did not know exactly what I did mean, I magnaniforming the ceremony, he would deposit it then and there. mously waived that portion of the service. I then told him it would be necessary to give bail to keep the peace. This he said he was willing to do as soon as he arrived home, and I then waived that point also.

Having established to my satisfaction that they wanted to get married, and that they were old enough to enter asked him if he was willing to take that woman to be his into that blessed state, I proceeded to tie the knot. I wife. He said he was. I told him I did not require haste

in the answer; that he might reflect a few minutes if he wished. I told him she looked like a fine girl, and I had no doubt she was; but if the sequel proved that he had been taken in, I did not want to be held responsible. I said he must love, honor, and obey her as long as she lived. He must not be "snappy" around the house, nor spit tobacco-juice upon the floor; all of which he promised faithfully to heed.

"Now," said I, “Georgiana" (her name was Georgiana), "you hear what Humphrey says. Do you accept of the invitation to become his wife? Will you be lenient toward his faults and cherish his virtues? Will you never be guilty of throwing furniture at his head for slight of fenses? And will you get three meals a day without grumbling?" She said she would. I asked them if they be

lieved in the commandments, and they said they did.

Having read the creed and articles of faith aforesaid, I exclaimed, "Humphrey, take her; she is yours. I can not withhold my consent. Georgiana, when safe in the

caverns of the earth; up to the crater, into the ice-region, eighteen thousand feet above the ocean level, where the sky loses its pure azure and deepens into a blue-black, and the lungs are tasked almost to bursting in the rarefied atmosphere-well, to come down into a steady square trot with the ribbons well in hand-an ascent of Popocatepetl, a thing easily imagined but by no means as easily accomplished, after a diligence and horseback ride of nearly sixty miles under a torrid sun, for the greater part through jungles and rocky passes and over serrated mountain ranges.

The summit is undoubtedly the loftiest point in North America-tabular statistics in the Geographies to the contrary notwithstanding-refinements in science which have attempted to snatch the crown from the hoary old god of the Toltecs and place it on the brow of that other storm-monarch of the Russians, Mount St. Elias. Much might be said about the relative claims of these dizzy peaks for the honors of altitude; but at present it is only the purpose of the writer to describe for "HARPER" an ascent to the crater lately accomplished by a party of three* and their guides, leaving the savans to discuss the correctness of certain trigonometrical observations which have deposed or reinstated the King of the Mexican Andes as best suited their own figures and calculations. Whatever may be the exact height-and we shall presently consider that subject-certain it is that whoever gains the summit may well congratulate himself that he has no farther cloud-climbing to accomplish.

Our preparations were made in the city of Mexico, and were simple enough. Sharpened hob-nails in the soles of the heavy shoes for scrambling up the ice; thick blankets and wrappers; spurs for persuading reluctant mules or horses toward the base of the mountain; goggles with green glasses and rims of thin wire for protecting the eyes from the glare of the sun; woolen mufflers for the face and neck; pistols, pocket-compass, barometer, spyglass, note-books, tin canteens for water, a flask of brandy each, and warm gloves and stockings. For several days we had been gazing off to the eastward, where the dome of the volcano loomed white and cold among the clouds, like some giant sentinel keeping guard over the continent; and more than once we half yielded to the warnings of friends, the Arnoux's, Corwin, Otterbourg, and others, whose traditionary legends of the difficulties and sufferings incident to the trip have been indorsed by the few who are known to have succeeded; but we had heard and read that the peak had several times been reached within the last half century, and we determined to proceed.

streets and out of the garita of San Lazaro. A word about that clock. Having rebelled against all rules of horology the venerable concern has acquired certain erratic habits, such as striking at discretion or not at all, as the whim suits. Malicious people say that a Mexican is stationed in the works with a club and watch, who shifts the hands and slams the hours with tolerable accuracy, save when he descends in quest of tortillas or pulque. At such times the machine goes it blind, so to speak, much to the consternation of victims who have set their time-pieces by it, and are not in the secret. But as Mexico is one of those places where time is not money, the panic is only temporary. So we started, and leaving the slumbering capital behind us, were soon rattling along the Camino Real behind eight horses, toward the reddening dawn, which gradually illumined the picturesque amphitheatre of the Valley of Mexico, tinting the towers and steeples of the city with a crimson flush, and bringing out all the glories of the tropical morning.

The road from Mexico to Chalco, which is on the route to the volcano, leads past the once celebrated Lake of Tezcuco where the Azter city of that name was located, once larger than Mexico itself, but of which only a few melancholy ruins remain. Lakes Xochimilco and Chalco, to the southward, containing yet a few of the celebrated chinampas, or floating gardens, are navigated by the same style of canoes and propelled by the same dusky race as when Cortéz wrested these strange lands from their Indian rulers. At Chalco we found lineal descendants of the tribes overpowered by the Spaniards, and still preserving the distinctive manners and language of their ancestors. An ancient canal connects the town with Mexico, a distance of some twenty miles, and here are "shipped" a large part of the fruit, vegetables, grain, fire-wood, and general supplies for the capital. A multitude of these industrious people were crowding around the embarcadero, and the place resounded with the bustle of a lucratíve inland trade. Patient, toilsome, and contented to be the drawers of water and hewers of wood for Mexico, they ask for nothing better than their customary tortillas and frijoles, with now and then a frantic "drunk" on pulque to celebrate some Saint's day or other festive occasion.

The cathedral clock was striking six as the diligence for Ameca lumbered through the

E. J. M'Cune of Cumberland Valley, Pennsylvania,

as the haunt of robbers, who have made this

their point of supplies, occasionally dashing into the Plaza and helping themselves to whatever the wretched stores offered in the way of plunder. Believing us to be Frenchmen the people put themselves to no trouble to find horses or mules for the trip, until one of the party accidentally announced that we were Americans, and then half a dozen frousy-headed, barefooted aboriginals started off to bring them. It seemed that "Americanos del Norte," though formerly the invaders of the country, were decidedly preferable to the red-breeched French, who spend no money, never mingle with the na

tives, and assume all the airs without displaying the liberality of conquerors.

While awaiting the animals we were accosted on the Plaza by two of Maximilian's military officers, whose bearing denoted the gentleman -a specimen of the genus homo never to be disguised under any circumstances. Our interview resulted in their offering us horses, and as the country thereabouts was infested with bands of thieves, the addition of five well-mounted soldiers to accompany us to Tlamacas and escort us back to Ameca on our descent from the mountain, we considered a special providence. The