of
her friends.

And when all is said and done, the highest and truest life is within
the reach of us all. Doing well whatever is given us to do will keep
us all busy, and married or single, no woman has a right to be idle.
The old maid may be womanly and mother-hearted as well as the wife and
mother.

The Spinster's Rubaiyat

I

Wake! For the hour of hope will soon take flight
And on your form and features leave a blight;
Since Time, who heals full many an open wound,
More oft than not is impolite.

II

Before my relatives began to chide,
Methought the voice of conscience said inside:
"Why should you want a husband, when you have
A cat who seldom will at home abide?"

III

And, when the evening breeze comes in the door,
The lamp smokes like a chimney, only more;
And yet the deacon of the church
Is telling every one my parrot swore.

IV

Behold, my aunt into my years inquires,
Then swiftly with my parents she conspires,
And in the family record changes dates--
In that same book that says all men are liars.

V

Come, fill the cup and let the kettle sing!
What though upon my finger gleams no ring,
Save that cheap turquoise that I bought myself?
The coming years a gladsome change may bring.

VI

Here, minion, fill the steaming cup that clears
The skin I will not have exposed to jeers,
And rub this wrinkle vigorously until
The maddening crow's-foot wholly disappears.

VII

And let me don some artificial bloom,
And turn the lamps down low, and make a gloom
That spreads from library to hall and stair;
Thus do I look my best--but ah, for whom?

The Rights of Dogs

We hear a great deal about the "rights of men" and still more,
perhaps, about the "rights of women," but few stop to consider those
which properly belong to the friend and companion of both--the dog.

According to our municipal code, a dog must be muzzled from June 1st
to September 30th. The wise men who framed this measure either did not
know, or did not stop to consider, that a dog perspires and "cools
off" only at his mouth.

Man and the horse have tiny pores distributed all over the body, but
in the dog they are found only in the tongue.

Any one who has had a fever need not be told what happened when these
pores ceased to act; what, then