d we left the house. The _coupe_ was waiting in the street and
set me down at my lodgings, after which it conveyed my companion to his.
Adolph did not seem to have a very clear idea of what had occurred, and
my impression is, that he went to sleep the moment the first strain of
music commenced.

'As for myself, I am not much clearer than Adolph as to how and why I
saw and heard what I know that I did see and hear. I can only say that
on that night of the twentieth December, 1860, the same on which, as it
afterward appeared, the ordinance of secession was adopted at
Charleston, I, in the little old two-story house in the Rue la Reynie
Ogniard, witnessed what I have related. What may be the omens, you may
judge as well as myself. How much of the sybil's prophecy is already
history, you know already. That SHOULDER-STRAPS, which I take to be _the
desire of military show without courage or patriotism_, are destroying
the armies of the republic, I am afraid there is no question. Perhaps
you can imagine why at the moment of hearing that there was a worm on my
shoulder for a shoulder-strap, I for the instant believed that it was
one of the hideous yellow monsters that I saw devouring the best
officers of the nation, and shrunk and shrieked like a whipped child. Is
not that a long story?' Martin concluded, lighting a fresh cigar and
throwing himself back from the table.

'Very long, and a little mad; but to me absorbingly interesting,' was my
reply, 'And in the hope that it may prove so to others, I shall use it
as a strange, rambling introduction to a recital of romantic events
which have occurred in and about the great city since the breaking out
of the rebellion, having to do with patriotism and cowardice, love,
mischief, and secession, and bearing the title thus suggested.'

A part of which stipulation is hereby kept, with the promise of the
writer that the remainder shall be faithfully fulfilled in forthcoming
numbers.

THE CHILDREN IN THE WOOD.

Tell us--poor gray-haired children that we are--
Tell us some story of the days afar,
Down shining through the years like sun and star.

The stories that, when we were very young,
Like golden beads on lips of wisdom hung,
At fireside told or by the cradle sung.

Not Cinderella with the tiny shoe,
Nor Harsan's carpet that through distance flew,
Nor Jack the Giant-Killer's derring-do.

Not even the little lady of the Hood,
But something sadder-