ready to commit murder, if necessary. Treat the strangers with every consideration possible under the circumstances. Should there be no champagne, apologize for the absence of it, and offer the next best vintage you happen to have. Of course, having lunched, the strangers will be eager to acquire possession of all valuables belonging to the party. The gentlemen, therefore, will make a point of promptly handing over to them their own watches and jewelry, as well as those of their lady friends.

Having arrived home, (we assume the possibility of this,) refrain, carefully, from communicating with the police on the subject of the events of the day. The publicity that would follow would render you an object of derision, and no possible good could result to you from disclosure of the facts. But you should at once make up your mind never to participate in another picnic.

A CHANCE FOR OUR ORGAN GRINDERS.

The famous mitrailleur, or grape-thrower, with which LOUIS NAPOLEON has already commenced to astonish the Prussians, suggests congenial work for the numerous performers on the barrel-organ with which our large cities are at all times infested. It is worked with a crank, exactly after the manner of the too-familiar street instrument; and might easily be fitted with a musical cylinder arranged for the performance of the most inspiriting and patriotic French airs. Should Italy, at present neutral, take side with France hereafter, she should at once withdraw her wandering minstrels from all parts of the world, and set them to work on the "double attachment" engine of L.N. Nothing could be more appropriate for working the mitrailleur than a corps of barrel-organ grinders from the land of the Grape.

THE ORIGIN OF PUNCHINELLO.

MR. PUNCHINELLO: Though aware that you "belong to Company G," and must not be bothered, I wish to ask whether you are descended from the famous chicken-dealer of Sorrento, who sold fowls in Naples, and was well-known in that fun-loving city for the humor of his speech and the oddity of his form. He was called "PULCINELLA," I believe, the name being the same as that of his wares.

If not to this celebrated wag, perhaps you trace your origin to Mr. PUCCIO D'ANELLO, who so delighted a company of actors at Aceria, with his jokes and gibes, that they invited him to join them, and soon discovered that they had found a Star.

If neither of these classical wags was your ancestor, may I ask, who the deuce did you come from? Yours, truly,

CURIOSO.

RECIPE TO BE TESTED.

We see that they have been "firing cannon in the fields near Paris, to bring on a rain." If there is any virtue in this recipe, they are likely to get some moist weather to the north-eastward of Paris, to say the least. The firing in that quarter may even lead to a Reign in Paris such as France has not lately seen. We would not go so far as to predict anything of this sort. Oh, no; for we are aware that the moment we should do so, NAPOLEON would lick the Prussians on purpose to show the world that we didn't hit it that time.

THE WATERING PLACES.

Punchinello's Vacations.

When one wants to see the great people who are to be seen nowhere else, one goes to the celebrated White Sulphur Springs of Virginia; and, very correctly supposing that there might be persons there who would like to see him, Mr. PUNCHINELLO took a trip to the aforesaid springs. He found it charming there. There was such a chance to study character. From the parlors where Chief-Justice CHASE and General LEE were hob-nobbing over apple-toddies and "peach-and-honey," to the cabins where the wards of the nation were luxuriating in picturesque ease beneath the shade of their newly-fledged angel of liberty, everything was instructive to the well-balanced mind.

Here, too, in these fertile regions, were to be seen those exquisite floral creations known as mint-juleps, the absence of which in our Northern agricultural exhibitions can never be sufficiently deplored.

Witness the beauty of the design and the ingenious delicacy of the execution of one of the humblest of the species.

From experience in the matter, Mr. P. is prepared to say, that not only as an exponent of the beauties of nature, but as a drink, a mint-julep is far superior to the water which gives thin resort its celebrity. Why people persist in drinking that vilest of all water which is found at the fashionable springs, Mr. P. cannot divine. If it is medicine you want, you can get your drugs at any apothecary's, and he will mix them in water for you for a very small sum extra. And the saving in expense of travel, board and extras, will be enormous.

But in spite of this fact, there were plenty of distinguished-looking people at the White Sulphur. Mr. P. didn't know them all, but he had no doubt that one of them was General LEE; one PHIL. SHERIDAN; another Prof. MAURY; another GOLDWIN SMITH; and others Governor WISE; HENRY WARD BEECHER, WADE HAMPTON, WENDELL PHILLIPS, RAPHAEL SEMMES, and LUCRETIA MOTT. One man, an incognito, excited Mr. P.'s curiosity. This personage was generally found in the society of LEE, JOHNSTON, POPE, HAMPTON, GREELEY, and those other fellows who did so much to injure the Union cause during the war. One day Mr. P. accosted him. He was an oddity, and perhaps it would be a good idea to put his picture in the paper.

"Sir!" said Mr. P., with that delicate consideration for which he is so noted, "why do you pull your hat down over your eyes, and what is your object in thus concealing your identity? Come sir! let us know what it all means."

The incognito glanced at Mr. P. with the corner of his eye, and perceiving that he was in citizen's dress, pulled his hat still further over his face.

"My business," said he, "is my own, but since the subject has been broached, I may as well let you know what it is."

"You know me, then?" said Mr. P.

"I do," replied the other, and proceeding with his recital, he said, "You may have heard that a number of negro squatters were lately ejected from a private estate in this State, after they had made the grounds to blossom like the rose, and to bring forth like the herring."

"Yes, I heard that," said Mr. P.

"Well," said the other, "I happened to have some land near by, and I invited those negroes to come and squat on my premises—"

"Intending to turn them off about blossoming time?" said Mr. P.

"Certainly, certainly," said the other, "and I am just waiting about here until they put in a wheat crop on part of the land. I can then sell that portion, right away."

"Well, Mr. BEN BUTLER," said Mr. P., "all that is easily understood, now that I know who you are; but tell me this, why are you so careful to cover your face when in the company of civilians or ladies, and yet go about so freely among these ex-Confederate officers?"

"Oh," said the other, "you see I don't want to be known down here, and some of the women or old men might remember my face. There's no danger of any of the soldiers recognizing me, you know."

"Oh, no," cried Mr. P. "None in the world, sir."

"And besides," said the modest BUTLER, "it's too late now for me to be spooning around among the women."

"That's so," said Mr. P. "Good-bye, BENJAMIN. Any news from Dominica?"

"None at all," said the other, "and I don't care if there never is. I am opposed to that annexation scheme now."

"Sold your claims?" said Mr. P. The incognito winked and departed.

That evening at supper Mr. P. remarked that his biscuits were rather hard, and he blandly requested a waiter to take one of them outside and crack it. The elder PEYTON, who runs the hotel, overheard Mr. P.'s remark, and stepping up to him, said:

"Sir, you should not be so particular about your food. What you pay me, while you stay at my place, is my charge for the water you drink. The food and lodging I throw in, gratis."

Mr. P. arose.

"Mr. PEYTON," said he, "when I was quite a little boy, my father, making the tour of America, brought me here, and I distinctly remember your making that remark to him. Since then many of my friends have visited the White Sulphur, and you invariably made the same remark to them. Is there no way to escape the venerable joke?"

The gentle PEYTON made no answer, but walked away, and after supper, one of the boarders took Mr. P. aside and urged him to excuse their host, as he was obliged to make the joke in question to every guest. The obligation was in his lease.

So the matter blew over.

Reflecting, however, that if he had to pay so much for the water, that he had better drink a little, Mr. P. went down to the spring to see what could be done. On the way, he met Uncle AARON, formerly one of WASHINGTON'S body-servants. The venerable patriarch touched his hat, and Mr. P., hoping from such great age to gain a little wisdom, propounded the following questions:

"Uncle, is this water good for the bile?"

"Oh, lor! no, mah'sr! Dat dar water 'ud jis spile anything you biled in it. Make it taste of rotten eggs, for all the world, sir! 'Deed it would.'

"But what I want to know," said Mr. P., "is why the people drink it."

"Lor' bless you, mah'sr! Dis here chile kin tell you dat. Ye see de gem'men from de Norf dey drinks it bekase they eat so much cold wheat bread. Allers makes 'em sick, sir."

"And why do the Southerners drink it?"

"Wal, mah'sr, you see dey eats so much hot wheat bread, and it don't agree wid 'em, no how."

"But how about the colored people? I have seen them drinking it, frequently," said Mr. P.

"Oh, lor, mah'sr, how you is a askin' questions! Don't you know dat de colored folks hab to drink it bekase dey don't get no wheat bread at all?"

Mr. P. heard no better philosophy than this on the subject while he remained at the White Sulphur. When he left, he brought a couple of gallons of the water with him, and intends keeping it in the water-cooler in his office, for loungers.

THE POEMS OF THE CRADLE.

CANTO III.

"JACK and GILL went up the bill
To fetch a pail of water;
JACK fell down and broke his crown,
And GILL came tumbling after."

How many persons there are who read those lines without giving one moment's thought to their hidden beauty. Love, obedience, and devotion unto death, are here portrayed; and yet people will repeat the lines of the melancholy muse with a smile on their faces, and even teach it to their young children as a sort of joyful lyric.

My own infant-mind was tampered with in the same manner; and after I had committed the poem to memory I was proudly called up by my fond and doting parents to display my infantile acquirements before admiring visitors. The result might have been foreknown. All my infancy and youth passed away, and I never once perceived the hidden worth of these lines till I had tumbled down a hill myself, cracked my crown, and was laid up with it a week or more. During that time I had leisure to muse on the fate of poor JACK. When my mind expanded so as to take in all the sublimity of his devotion and death, my heart was filled with admiration and astonishment, and I resolved I would make one effort to rescue the memory of poor JACK and loving GILL from the oblivion it seemed to be falling into, in the greater admiration people gave to the musical style of the writer.

"JACK and GILL went up the hill."

Here you see the obedient, loving, long-suffering, put-upon drudge of his brothers and sisters-we will take the liberty of giving him a few of each as we are a little more generous than the author—who was compelled (not the author, but JACK,) to do all the chores, fetch and carry, 'tend and wait, bear the heat and burden of the day, and be the JACK for all of them. He was not dignified by the respectable title of JOHN, or JONATHAN, but was poor simple JACK.

Virtue will always be rewarded, however, and even freckle-faced, red-headed JACK had one friend, blue-eyed, tender-hearted GILL, who, seeing the unhesitating obedience he rendered to all, forthwith concluded that one so lone and sad could appreciate true friendship and understand the motives that prompted her to give, unsolicited, her gushing love. So, when the good JACK started up the hill, loving GILL generously offered to accompany him. Probably the other children looked out of the windows after them, and laughed, and jeered, and wondered whither they were going; but, observing the pail, concluded they were going

"To fetch a pail of water,"

which they were willing JACK should do, as it would save them the possibility of being ordered to do it; not that there was a probability of such a command being given, but there was a slight danger that the thing might happen in case JACK was occupied otherwise when the water was needed. But now that he had gone for it, they were all right, and rejoiced exceedingly thereat.

Meanwhile the two little sympathizing companions toiled up the steep hill, drinking in with every inhalation of the balmy air copious draughts of the new-found elixir of life. "Soft eyes looked love to eyes that spake again,"^[2] and their hearts melted beneath each tender glance. The little chubby hands that grasped the handle of the pail timidly crept closer together, and by the time they had reached the rugged top, it needed but one warm embrace to mingle the two souls into one, henceforth forever.

This was done.

Tremblingly they drew back, blushing, casting modest glances at each other; and then, to aid them in recovering from their confusion, turned their attention to the water, which reflected back two happy, smiling faces. Filling the pail with the dimpled liquid mirror, they turned their steps homeward.

Light at heart and intoxicated with bliss, poor JACK, ever unfortunate, dashed his foot against a stone, and thus it was that

"JACK fell down and broke his crown."

[Oh! what a fall was there, my countrywomen!] Fearful were the shrieks that rent the mountain air as he rolled down the hillside. The pail they had carried so carefully was overturned and rent asunder, and the trembling water spilled upon the smiling hill-side—fit emblem of their vanishing hopes.

Down went the roley-poley boy, like a dumpling down a cellar-door; crashing his head against the cruel rocks that stood in stony heartedness in his way, and dashing his brains out against their hard sides. His loving companion, eyes and month dilated with horror, stood still and rigid, gazing upon the fearful descent, and its tragic ending, then throwing her arms aloft, and giving a fearful shriek of agony that thrilled with horror the hearts of the hearers—if there were any—cast herself down in exact imitation of the fall of her hero, rolled over and over as he did, and ended by mingling her blood with his upon the same stones.

His crown was broken diagonally; hers slantindicularly; that was the only difference. Her suicidal act is commemorated in the line,