of that snowball, believe me or not, as you like, the weather suddenly
changed and became hot and summerlike, and Jones, instead of being hit
with a snowball, was scalded with hot water!"--_Tit-Bits._

PERSUASION BETTER THAN FORCE.

"Talk of opening oysters," said old Hurricane, "why, nothing's easier, if
you only know how."

"And how's how?" inquired Starlight.

"Scotch snuff," answered old Hurricane very sententiously. "Scotch snuff.
Bring a little of it ever so near their noses and they'll sneeze their
lids off."

"I know a genius," observed Meister Karl, "who has a better plan. He
spreads the bivalves in a circle, seats himself in the center, and begins
spinning a yarn. Sometimes it's an adventure in Mexico--sometimes a legend
of his loves--sometimes a marvelous stock operation in Wall Street.

"As he proceeds, the 'natives' get interested--one by one they gape with
astonishment at the tremendous and direful whoppers which are poured
forth, and as they gape my friend whips them out, peppers 'em, and
swallows them."

"That'll do," said Starlight, with a long sigh. "I wish we had a bushel of
the bivalves here now, they'd open easy."--_Philadelphia Post._

EDUCATED RATS.

By Neal Dow.

In the _Congregationalist_ is a curious story about rats, which seems to
indicate that they will not remain where their company is not desired, if
politely invited to change their quarters, though everybody knows that
they are driven out with difficulty. Here is a perfectly true story which
corroborates that one.

My house is supposed to be rat-proof, and was so when quite new, but at
one time, more than twenty years ago, we had a large colony of the
rodents, greatly to our annoyance, and it was with us a matter of daily
wonder where they found a weak spot in our defenses among them. One
evening a young lady from a friend's family, living in a large, fine house
nearly a mile away, was with us, and the talk turned on rats, as we heard
ours scampering up and down the walls.

The young lady said that none had ever been in their house, and she did
not think there was any point at which they could enter. My eldest
daughter, a great wit, said: "I've heard that, if politely invited to do
so in writing, rats will leave any house and go to any other to which they
may be directed, and I will tell ours that at your house they will find
spacious quarters and an excellent commissariat."

At the moment, before us all, she wrote t