Harper's Young People, April 20, 1880 Part 11

With Eighty Ill.u.s.trations, from Designs by STEINLE, OVERBECK, VEIT, SCHNORR, &c.

The Children's Picture Fable-Book.

Containing One Hundred and Sixty Fables. With Sixty Ill.u.s.trations by HARRISON WEIR.

The Children's Picture-Book of Birds.

With Sixty-one Ill.u.s.trations by W. HARVEY.

The Children's Picture-Book of Quadrupeds and other Mammalia.

With Sixty-one Ill.u.s.trations by W. HARVEY.

Published by HARPER & BROTHERS, New York.

_Sent by mail, postage prepaid, to any part of the United States, on receipt of the price._

[Ill.u.s.tration: "SPRING, SPRING, BEAUTIFUL SPRING."]

=A Wonderful Clock.=--The most astonishing thing ever heard of in the way of a time-piece is a clock described by a Hindoo Rajah as belonging to a native Prince of Upper India, and jealously guarded as the rarest treasure of his luxurious palace. In front of the clock's disk was a gong, swung upon poles, and near it was a pile of artificial human limbs. The pile was made up of the full number of parts of twelve perfect bodies, but all lay heaped together in seeming confusion.

Whenever the hands of the clock indicated the hour of one, out from the pile crawled just the number of parts needed to form the frame of one man, part joining itself to part with quick metallic click; and when completed, the figure sprang up, seized a mallet, and walking up to the gong, struck one blow that sent the sound pealing through every room and corridor of that stately palace. This, done, he returned to the pile, and fell to pieces again. When two o'clock came, two men arose and did likewise; and so through all the hours, the number of figures being the same as the number of the hour, till at noon and midnight the entire heap sprang up, and marching to the gong, struck one after another each his blow, and then fell to pieces.

THE PENGUIN PUZZLE.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

With two straight cuts of the scissors change this fish into an absurd penguin catching a herring.

CHARADE.

An Emperor kneels in sore dismay, For his enemy cometh apace.

In this hour of need to whom shall he pray?

From which of his G.o.ds seek grace?

To his father's G.o.d, the One, the Alone, He cried, and the answer burst On his wondering eyes: a marvel shone, Pledge of hope and help from the G.o.d unknown, And that answering sign was my _first_.

Some voyagers weary of wooden walls Are treading the land once more.

The father around him his children calls, Their G.o.d, who had saved, to adore.

Seven angels all hasten G.o.d's answer to bring, Of His promise the seal and the sign; Arrayed is each one as the child of a King; Together they rival the flowers of spring, And together my _second_ they shine.

King Henry hath crossed over into France With his lords and his n.o.bles gay.

He would teach the Frenchman quite a new dance, And bid him the piper to pay.

Such his design; but the end who can tell?

Who the fortunes of battle control?

One thing I aver, and none will demur: If King Henry succeeds, 'twill be by the deeds Of his soldiers, who carry my _whole_.

=An Ancient Castle.=--The Czarowitz recently visited, with King Oscar II., the famous old castle of Gripshon, in Sweden. The old keeper showed the Czarowitz a heap of straw, and told him that his father, the present Czar, had used it as his bed in the year 1838. Alexander in that year accompanied his father, Czar Nicholas, to Sweden, and it was during their visit to the castle that that severe parent insisted upon making his son sleep on straw. It is popularly believed in Russia that the stern Nicholas never allowed his son and heir to sleep upon any more comfortable bed.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ANTIc.i.p.aTION. CONSTERNATION. CASTIGATION.

LITTLE TOMMY'S FIRST (_AND LAST_) EXPERIMENT WITH HIS TOY SPIDER.]