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THE BAGGAGE-WAGON.

ΜΑΝ

ANY of our older people remember those early days of Western migration, before railroads were constructed and telegraphs dreamed of, when not only foreign immigrants just landed, but native families from the Atlantic coast, went painfully and slowly westward into the unsettled regions to better their fortunes and grow up with the development of the country. We can still recall the large lumbering wagon, covered and uncovered, stuffed and filled with all their worldly goods. They bravely endured many hardships and encountered many perils. Sometimes hostile Indians, scenting the spoil from far away, sprang from their

ing dogs, the gleam on harness and animals and boxes, form a picture upon which the imagination builds a story of pain and suffering.

Let us hope that the storm will abate, that the halting-place is near, that a clear starlight will watch over their well-earned rest, and that the morrow's sun will pour its radiant beams upon a happy and hopeful band as once more they cry, "Westward ho!"

WHICH WILL HE CHOOSE?

FROM THE FRENCH OF JOSEPH XAVIER BONIFACE
SAINTINE.

Y

that

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ambush with rifle and tomahawk, scalped My friend Cabassol used to say the men, carried off the women and chilfamily, to be quite complete, should dren, and wasted and revelled in the plun- consist of a father and mother, a son and der. Around the wagon-barricades at night daughter, and a dog. There was a time, the panther cried and the wolf howled, their indeed, when he never would have said it, eyes shining like lurid stars in the fitful light but that was when he was a bachelor; for of the camp-fire. Sometimes the prairie-grass he was the crustiest bachelor that I ever caught fire, and soon a vast sheet of flame knew. He lived by himself in the counbore down upon them on the wings of mighty try, where he smoked his pipe and read his winds. When belated sometimes in reaching books, and took care of his garden or walked their night's encampment, the heavens grew over the fields with his dog. Yes, he had a suddenly black, and a great storm would dog, a perfect one, named Medor, and in burst upon them. The darkness would be those days he thought a perfect family confor a moment dispelled by the blinding flash, sisted of a man and his dog. Medor had to return again with a dazing and double belonged to a widow-lady living at St. Gerobscurity. It would seem to them that the main-en-Laye who thought the world of him, Lord himself was arrayed against them. but was in constant fear lest he should be Was not the Psalmist's verse in the art- shot; for Medor was a born hunter, and the ist's thought as he boldly attempted to paint forest-park at St. Germain was an inviting the flash and the glare?" His lightnings field for four-footed as well as two-footed gave shine unto the world; the earth saw hunters. The keepers of the park declared it and was afraid." The crouching men, they would shoot Medor if they caught him the women and children seeking to hide there again; so his mistress begged me to their faces, the frightened horses, the shrink- | save his life by finding for him a new mas

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ter. I thought at once of Cabassol, and I could not have found a better master. He and Medor became at once fast friends, and understood each other perfectly. They were made for one another, and were always together.

But one day, when Medor's nose was in his plate and he seemed to be thinking of nothing but his dinner, he suddenly raised his head and, trembling from head to foot, began to howl and whine in the most piteous and unaccountable manner. The door-bell rang. Medor sprang forward; and when Cabassol joined him, he found him rolling in an ecstasy of joy at the feet of a stranger and leaping up and down as if beside himself. It was, as you have guessed, his old mistress, who had moved from St. Germain to live in Paris, and had taken this journey for the sake of seeing her old friend Medor. She cried at the welcome her dog had given her. She had come, she said, to ask him back again; for, now that she lived in Paris, there was no longer any danger of his life from the foresters. Would not Monsieur Cabassol permit her to have Medor again? She would gladly pay whatever he chose to ask for Medor's board during the three years he had been absent from her, and

a round sum besides.

ner.

Medor die of grief by refusing to give him up to her.

"See!" she cried; "he has never ceased to regret me. He still loves me, and no one else."

These last words enraged Cabassol; they aroused his pride, and, determined to show her that Medor loved him best, he said,

'Come! I have a plan which will soon show you whether Medor loves you more than me. We will go together to yonder hill. There we will separate. You shall go down the southern path, and I will take the northern; that comes back to my house. Medor shall belong to whichever of us he chooses to follow."

"Very well," said she; "I am agreed;" for she was confident that the dog would follow her.

Medor did not quite understand the agreement, but he saw that the two people whom he loved best had shaken hands and stopped quarrelling, and were now talking politely together. He was full of delight, gambolling about them and petted by both. Cabassol, though a crusty bachelor, was, after all, a pleasant companion when he chose; and now, feeling some pity for the lady, who must be disappointed, he began to make himself quite agreeable, for she was his

Cabassol looked at her in a furious man- and Medor's guest, after all; and the wid

Give up his dog? Never!

"I will not sell my friend at any price," he cried, and gave a rude shrug of his shoulders, which said as plainly as words, "Go about your business, madame."

The lady bitterly reproached him, and grew very angry, not because he had treated her so rudely, which was reason enough-she did not mind that—but because he was likely to make

ow-lady, sorry for the loss which she was to cause him and feeling happy at recovering Medor, was in high spirits and made herself quite entertaining.

When the time came for her to go, the three walked slowly together to the top of the hill-the two, I mean; for Medor was frisking about them in great glee. At the top they separated, and Cabassol went at

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