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O THOU WHO SIGHEST FOR A BROADER FIELD.

JULIA ANNA WOLCOTT.

O THOU Who sighest for a broader field

Wherein to sow the seeds of truth and right,
Who fain a nobler, wider power wouldst wield
O'er human souls that languish for the light;

Search well the realm that even now is thine!
Canst not thou in some far-off corner find
A heart, sin-bound, as tree with sapping vine,
That waiteth help its burdens to unbind?

Some human plant, perchance beneath thine eyes,
Pierced through by hidden thorns of idle fears;
Or, drooping low for need of light from skies

Obscured by doubt-clouds, raining poison tears?

Some bruised soul the balm of love would heal?
Some timid spirit faith would courage give?
Or maimèd brother who, though brave and leal,
Still needeth thee to rightly walk and live?

Oh, while one soul thou find'st that hath not known
The fullest help thy soul hath power to give,
Sigh not for fields still broader than thine own,
But, steadfast, in thine own more broadly live!

AN EVENING AT THE CORNER GROCERY.

A WESTERN CHARACTER SKETCH.

BY HAMLIN GARLAND.

COLONEL PEAVY had just begun the rubber with Judge Gordon of Cerro-Gordo County. They were seated in Robie's grocery, behind the rusty old cannon stove, the checker-board spread out on their knees. The Colonel was grinning in great glee, wringing his bony yellow hands in nervous excitement, in strong contrast to the stolid calm of the fat Judge.

The Colonel had won the last game by a large margin, and was sure he had his opponent's "dodges" well in hand. It was early in the evening, and the grocery was comparatively empty. Robie was figuring at a desk, and old Judge Brown stood in legal gravity warming his legs at the redhot stove, and swaying gently back and forth in speechless content. It was a tough night outside, one of the toughest for years. The frost had completely shut the window panes as with thick blankets of snow. The streets were silent. "I don't know," said the Judge, reflectively, to Robie, breaking the silence in his rasping, judicial bass, “I don't know as there has been such a night as this since the night of February 2d, '59, that was the night James Kirk went under — Honorable Kirk, you remember, - knew him well. Brilliant fellow, ornament to western bar. But whiskey downed him. It'll beat the oldest man-I wonder where the boys all are to-night? Don't seem to be anyone stirring on the street. Aint frightened out by the cold?"

"Shouldn't wonder." Robie was busy at his desk, and not in humor for conversation on reminiscent lines. The two old war-dogs at the board had settled down to one of those long, silent struggles, which ensue when two "champions meet. In the silence which followed, the Judge was look

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ing attentively at the back of the Colonel, and thinking that the old thief was getting about down to skin and bone. He turned with a yawn to Robie, saying:

"This cold weather must take hold of the old Colonel terribly, he's so damnably thin and bald, you know, — bald as a babe. The fact is, the old Colonel aint long for this world, anyway; think so, Hank?" Robie making no reply, the Judge relapsed into silence for a while, watching the cat (perilously walking along the edge of the upper shelf) and listening to the occasional hurrying footsteps outside. "I don't know when I've seen the windows closed up so, Hank; go down to thirty below to-night; devilish strong wind blowing, too; tough night on the prairies, Hank."

"You bet," replied Hank, briefly. The Colonel was plainly getting excited. His razor-like back curved sharper than ever as he peered into the intricacies of the board to spy the trap which the fat Judge had set for him. At this point the squeal of boots on the icy walk outside paused, and a moment later Amos Ridings entered, with whiskers covered with ice, and looking like a huge bear in his buffalo coat.

"By Josephus! it's cold," he roared, as he took off his gloves and began to warm his face and hands at the fire.

"Is it?" asked the Judge, comfortably, rising on his tiptoes, only to fall back into his usual attitude, legal legs well spread, shoulders thrown back.

"You bet it is!" replied Amos. "I'd'know when I've felt the cold more'n I have t'-day. It's jest snifty; doubles me up like a jack-knife, Judge. How d' you stand it?" "Tollerble, tollerble, Amos. But we're agein', we aint what we were once. Cold takes hold of us."

"That's a fact," answered Amos to the retrospective musings of the Judge. "Time was you an' me would go t' singing-school or sleigh-riding with the girls on a night like this and never notice it."

"Yes, sir; yes, sir!" said the Judge with a sigh. It was a little uncertain in Robie's mind whether the Judge was regretting the lost ability to stand the cold, or the lost pleasure of riding with the girls.

"Great days, those, gentlemen! Lived in Vermont then. Hot-blooded-lungs like an ox. I remember, Sallie Dearborn and I used to go a-foot to singing school down the valley four miles. But now, wouldn't go riding to-night with

the handsomest woman in America, and the best cutter in Rock River."

"Oh! you've got both feet in the grave up t' the ankles, anyway," said Robie from his desk, but the Judge immovably gazed at the upper shelf on the other side of the room where the boilers, and pans, and washboards were stored.

"The Judge is a little on the sentimental order to-night,” said Amos.

"Hold on, Colonel! hold on. You've got 'o jump. He! he!" roared Gordon from the checker-board. "That's right, that's right!" he ended, as the Colonel complied reluctantly.

"Sock it to the old cuss," commented Amos. “What I was going to say," he resumed, rolling down the collar of his coat, "was, that when my wife helped me bundle up t' night, she said I was gitt'n' t' be an old granny. We are agein', Judge, the's no denyin' it. We're both gray as Norway rats now. An' speaking of us ageing reminds me, noticed how bald the old Kyernel's gitt'n'?"

have y'

"I have, Amos," answered the Judge, mournfully. "The old man's head is showing age, showing age! Getting thin up there, aint it?" The old Colonel bent to his work without reply, and even when Amos said, judicially, after long scrutiny, "Yes, he'll soon be as bald as a plate," he only lifted one yellow, freckled, bony hand, and brushed his carroty growth of hair across the spot under discussion. Gordon shook his fat paunch in silent laughter, nearly displacing the board.

"I was just telling Robie," pursued Brown, still retaining his reminiscent intonation, "that this storm takes the cake over anything—"

At this point Steve Roach and another fellow entered. Steve was Ridings' hired hand, a herculean fellow, with a drawl, and a liability for taking offence quite as remarkable.

"Say! gents, I'm no spring rooster, but this jest gits away with anything in line of cold I ever see.”

While this communication was being received in ruminative silence, Steve was holding his ears in his hand and gazing at the intent champions at the board. There they sat; the old Judge panting and wheezing in his excitement, for he was planning a great "snap" on the Colonel, whose red and freckled nose almost touched the board. It was a

solemn battle hour. The wind howled mournfully outside, the timbers of the stove creaked in the cold, and the huge cannon stove roared in steady bass.

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'Speaking about ears, " said Steve, after a silence, “dumned if I'd like t' be quite s' bare 'round the ears as Kernel there. I wonder if any o' you fellers has noticed how the ol' feller's lost hair this last summer. He's gittin' bald, they's no coverin' it up - gittin' bald as a plate.' "You're right, Stephen," said the Judge, as he gravely took his stand behind his brother advocate, and studied, with the eye of an adept, the field of battle. "We were noticing it when you came in. It's a sad thing, but it must be admitted."

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"It's the Kyernel's brains wearin' up through his hair, I take it," commented Amos, as he helped himself to a handful of peanuts out of a bag behind the counter. "Say, Steve, did y' stuff up that hole in front of ol' Barney?"

A shout was heard outside, and then a rush against the door, and immediately two young fellows burst in, followed by a fierce gust of snow. One was Professor Knapp, the

other Editor Foster, of the Morning Call.

"Well, gents, how's this for high?" said Foster in a peculiar tone of voice, at which all began to smile. He was a slender fellow with close-clipped, assertive red hair. "In this company we now have the majesty of the law, the power of the press, and the underpinning of the American civilization all represented. Hello! There are a couple of old roosters with their heads together. Gordon, my old enemy, how are you?"

Gordon waved him off with a smile and a wheeze. "Don't bother me now. I've got 'im. I'm laying f'r the old dog. Whist!"

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if you want to.

"Got nothing!" snarled the Colonel. Just swing that man in it's healthy for him. Just as like as not, that little trick."

"You try that on

there if you think you'll slip up on

"Ha! Say you so, old True Penny? The Kunnel has met a foeman worthy of his steel," said Foster in great glee, as he bent above the Colonel. "I know. How do I know? quotha. "By the curve on the Kunnel's back. The size of the parabola described by that backbone accurately gauges his adversary's skill. But, by the way, gentlemen,

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