which will come much closer to you, | while you will also be sure to find many of the same features common to the "mountain road" and other roads. Their trickling cliffs, with their nodding columbines and mountain laurels; their wayside thickets of sumac, elders, mountain raspberry, and moose-wood with its large heart-shaped leaves, checkered, splashed, laugh again and again at the gushing ardor of those comical bobolinks fluttering through the air in their pell-mell rhapsody, and dropping exhausted in the grass, or alighting out of breath upon the jutting fence rail. And then you will leave the darkness of some hemlock grove to open out upon that old rickety toll-bridge which we all CROSSING THE FORD. and blotched with crimson, as though painted by the falling drops of "red ink" from those poke-berries hanging in such long clusters above them. You will be sure to creep along the edge of that field of clover, timothy, and purple grasses, with its nodding lilies and its dusty milkweeds; you will see the mowers swing their scythes; and you will watch and At your approach a queer little old man will appear, stepping lazily from his doorway near the end of the bridge, and perhaps also his pretty, red-lipped, buxom daughter, and you will be certain to look to and fro from one to the other in utter amazement at such a possible freak of nature. If it is he, he will look you over, and take you all in through his big blue goggles in his own good time; and should he be the little dried-up old specimen that I remember, he will then remark, "They's three on ye, caountin' the hoss-fifteen cents." Or if it is she, there will be held out a very differentlooking hand, be assured, accompanied by a winning smile and a pleasant voice"Fifteen cents, please." And, by-the-way, while you are fumbling so absently for the change-if you will permit a friendly suggestion-you would make a much more expeditious matter of it were you to fix your eyes more at your pocket-book, and less at those moist red lips and those white teeth and the golden brown of that flowing sunny hair. Now, if you choose, you can turn directly along the sandy road which follows the winding river, passing beneath the shade of the giant buttonwood-trees-the kaleidoscopes among trees -whose perpetual shaling bark keeps their trunks painted with ever-changing mottlings. See the fresh green blotch from which only a moment ago with its bright metallic needle. You can hear the flip-flap of the running waves beneath those flat bows; and now there is a rising tumult in the water, a sun-flash, a spattering, and a wriggling, and now a has a curly flake fallen. In a few days it will have become sobered into a tender gray, and the loose brown piece which hangs along its edge will crackle and fall, carrying with it that hidden tuft of spider-eggs, and bringing to full view that white blotch which even now shows beneath its shadow. And this same process is continued more or less throughout the year, from its huge stem clear to the branch tips, and there is a new set of tints with almost every month. Here your attention will be arrested out in mid-stream, perhaps, by the sound of low voices or rattle of an oar among some party of anglers anchored in the stream. You can see the bobber dance upon the ripples, and if you look very sharply you can almost detect that tiny dragon-fly, the little blue-bodied sunbeam, which is certainly fluttering about on its filmy rainbow wings above the water, now settling lightly upon the rowlock, or even poising to thread that pendent fish-line flopping on the bottom of the boat. You had forgotten your carriage; your whip had become a fish-pole on the instant; it was raised with a snap-and away starts your pony through the lowhanging willows that sweep across your face. Suddenly they let you out again upon a stretch of deep white sand, where nimble tiger-beetles rise and glisten in their short flights before you, and your very ears seem to vibrate with the dizzy, busy buzz of cricket life among the roadside weeds and sedges. We will not forget that green-eyed horse-fly, nor the swarm of huge mosquitoes, with their striped stockings and their tremendous thirst, nor that friendly counsel from over a road-side fence, as we hesitated at the ford: "Ye want to start in jest whar ye see thet ar' stun stickin' aout o' water, 'n' then folly the ripple right araound. Keep clus into it, 'n' ye can't go wrong; 'n' ef I wuz yeu I sh'd jes' be gittin' right along, fer I'm cal'latin' we're a-goin' to git a leetle tech o' rain aout o' thet ar' claoud, 'n' the ripples all goes in the rain." There are a hundred other things which come crowding on the thought. There was a splash in a puddle, where every drop seemed to give birth to a score of yellow butterflies that flew up about us in a fluttering swarm; a row of twittering swallows on a wire; a rumbling, top-heavy stage-coach, with six galloping horses, and cheering crowd up aloft, dodging beneath the maple branches; or a friendly chat with the quaint old village doctor in his ancient one-horse chaise. There was a luscious quaff of wine from the purple clusters of wild cherries, picked from the carriage from an overhanging bough; and other little pleasantries. That tight-drawn spider web, for instance, that cut and snapped across your face; that clumsy, rattle-jointed grasshopper that bumped against your cheek, and landed kicking in your lap; or perhaps a wriggling inch-worm, that has hung himself for amusement, swinging directly in your path, awaiting what would seem to be the ambition of his life, an opportunity to measure the length of your nose-and which he actually did. Yes, they are all trivial, I know; but then how large a place do such small trifles hold in the grand total of a summer's holiday! But even the loveliest road in New England would erelong, I fear, find its limit in our capacity of enjoyment. The eye is surfeited and the mind often confused at the endless pageantry, and unless the shadows of the twilight come to our rescue there is danger that it may at length prove a tedious journey. Then let the restful quiet of the gathering darkness fall upon our roadway as we have so often seen it, when the dusky gloom veiled the landscape in obscurity, and our path ahead was lost in a glamour of vague, impenetrable mystery. The air is still. The sheltered spots among the lowlands and the alders are white and ghostly with their gathering fog. Even in the dimness we can see it floating and creeping among the willows, where the gurgling water gives it birth, and launches it among the bogs and sedges. How still and motionless the leaves! Not even a good-night whisper from the aspentrees. The gnats are dancing in the quiet air. We can not see them, but we hear their singing wings. The rising mist has stolen close about us, we feel its chill, and it has become redolent with the damp odors of the brooks and marshes, while now and then there steals upon the senses that delicate dew-born perfume, the faint pure breath from some awakening primrose, lighting its pale yellow lamp amid the gloaming. The naiads of the pond, enshrouded in their veil of mist, have long since gone to rest, and could our eyes but penetrate the dim shadows around us, we might discover the drowsy clover leaves losing themselves in sleep, with folded palms and heads bowed down beneath the benediction of the dew. You may hear, perhaps, amid the silence, the plaintive wail of some whip-poor-will far away, or a slight rustling among the leaves overhead; but it is not the breeze that rustles. It is some soft-winged owl that has left his perch for his mission of dark deeds, or some night-flying moth, perhaps, seeking his mate among the shadows. And how full of strangeness is this mysterious commotion, drawing nearer and nearer to you in the darkness, how weird and inexplicable, until you hear the boyish whistle, the clatter of the loosened bars, and now the clear calling voice ringing in the still night air! And hark! how soon there comes an answering tinkle from the gloom. Now a harsh grating note of the first katydid sounds high above in the maple-tree. Another and another seem waiting to take up the challenge, and the air soon vibrates with the never-ending discord of their noisy multitudes. Moment by moment the road-side has wrapped itself in obscurity, and now there is nothing left but the black curtain of the night thrown over all. Nothing visible. yes, the tiny lanterns of the sporting fireflies that have come to seek us in the darkness; but we are gone. Ah, JOURNALISTIC LONDON. First Paper. HUNDRED years | eating-room beyond the passage over ago, Fleet Street which Grindley Gibbons's chanticleer still mounts its ancient guard looks strangely out of keeping with the wooden pavement and the electric lamps of these brand-new days. was the most picturesque, as it is to-day the most characteristic, of London thor- The history of Fleet Street would be a oughfares. In chronicle of the rise and progress of the the earliest days London press. For that matter, it could of George the be made the basis of a history of the meThird, Temple tropolis, not to say the story of England Bar was the por- itself, for it has classic links of fact that tal of an avenue loop events away back in the furthermost of many-gabled ages of darkness. All the more fitting is houses, from it that the press should set up in this rewhich swung gion the fierce light that burns upon its trade signs of in- ever-flaming altars. Who that is not ocnumerable variety. There were Saracens' cupied with that constant thirst of gold Heads and Golden Keys, Red Lions and which influences many of the crowd toBlue Boars, Bibles and Crowns and Mi- day hurrying cityward can walk along tres. By day they made a brave show of Fleet Street without thinking of the "footcolor. At night they creaked and groaned prints on the sands of time" which this hisa chorus of strange accompaniment to the toric thoroughfare recalls? Shakspeare, watchmen's hourly records of Time's wea- Ben Jonson, Walter Raleigh, Dryden, Dr. ry progress. The dirty sidewalk was sep- Johnson, Goldsmith, Garrick, have met arated from the dirtier roadway by posts, here for work and gossip, and in later over which the boys of the time played days Cobbett and Theodore Hook, Thackleap-frog, while cumbrous hackney car- eray and Dickens, Hood and Jerrold, have riages churned into mud the various ref- carried on the old street's splendid succesuse flung into the street by thoughtless sion. The site of London's most famous housewives and "idle apprentices." Se taverns, it has always been a great literadan-chairs were carried hither and thither, ry and journalistic centre. A few illusattended by linkboys, and occasionally in-trative instances of both these features terrupted by marauding foot-pads. Bob- may be mentioned here. Where the Rainwigs and buckled shoes were the fashion; bow now dispenses old English fare, the and the miscellaneous crowd that passed Devil Tavern stood. The legend of St. through the frowning bar was as pictur- Dunstan tweaking his Satanic Majesty's esque as the street itself. To-day a griffin nose originated the sign. Simon Wadloe, spreads a pair of bat-like wings over the "the king of skinners," kept the house. spot where Traitor's Gate barred the nar- He was immortalized in Squire Western's row way. The hybrid monster which the favorite song, "Sir Simon the King." corporation have set up to mark the city The tavern had among its customers John boundary is the civic crest; and had the Cottington, alias "Mull Sack," the highfabulous creature been reared aloft on a wayman, who divided his favors between mighty pillar towering up into the clouds, king and commonwealth, first by picking the effect would have been dignified, if not the pocket of Oliver Cromwell, and then grand. As it is, coming from the west, it by robbing King Charles the Second's is not the contemptuous thing severe crit- chambers at Cologne of a vast quantity ics would have us believe, though as a of plate. The impartial thief was finally work of art it is not altogether a satisfac- hanged at Tyburn for murder. The Globe tory performance. "The Cock," whose was a well-known tavern, frequented by plump head waiter has been sung by the Macklin, the comedian, Carnan, the bookLaureate, no longer poses in leaf of gold seller, and William Woodfall, the first Parwithin the shadow of Temple Bar. Such liamentary reformer. daylight as there is hereabouts now falls full upon the gilded bird, and the old Vol. LXIII-No. 377.-42 The Cock Tavern remains to-day almost in the same condition as it was when |