; A Bumble Grumble--Pretty Dusty
Wings--Trees that Rain--Shooting Stars--Coasting in
August--More about Turtles--A Fish that Weaves its Nest--A
Clever Humming-bird (illustrated), 632; Introduction--The
Seventeen-year Locust (illustrated)--The Great Lubber Locust
(illustrated)--The Dog and the Queer Grasshoppers
(illustrated), 712; Introduction--Longfellow's First
Letter--The Water-snake as a Fisherman--More Animal
Weather-Prophets--A Useful Bird with an Aristocratic Name--A
Wise Humming-bird--The Pitcher Plant (illustrated), 792;
Introduction--Poor Lark!--Those Mocking-birds Again--A Living
Island (illustrated)--Wrong Names for Things--Who can Answer
This? 872; Introduction--A Perfectly Quiet Day--How He Proved
It--Walking Without Legs--A Queer Sunshade (illustrated)--A
Queer Jumble--That Dear Little Lord, 952.

THE AGASSIZ ASSOCIATION. (Illustrated) 557, 636, 717, 794, 874, 957

THE LETTER-BOX. (Illustrated) 554, 634, 714, 796, 876, 954

THE RIDDLE-BOX. (Illustrated) 559, 639, 719, 799, 879, 959

EDITORIAL NOTES 554, 634

FRONTISPIECES.

"In Spring-time--When Shakspere was a Boy," by Leon Moran,
facing Title-page of Volume--"A June Morning," by E. C. Held,
facing page 563--"La Fayette and the British Ambassador," by
F. H. Lungren, facing page 643--"The Captain and the
Captain's Mate," by Mary Hallock Foote, facing page 723--"The
Connoisseurs," after a painting by Sir Edwin Landseer, facing
page 803--"Martha Washington," from an unfinished portrait by
Gilbert Stuart, facing page 883.

[Illustration: IN SPRING-TIME--WHEN SHAKSPERE WAS A BOY.

(SEE PAGE 490.)]

ST. NICHOLAS.

VOL. XIII. MAY, 1886. NO. 7.

[Copyright, 1886, by THE CENTURY CO.]

When Shakspere was a Boy

BY ROSE KINGSLEY.

On Henley street, in quiet Stratford town, there stands an old
half-timbered house. The panels between the dark beams are of
soft-colored yellow plaster. The windows are filled with little diamond
panes; and in one of the upper rooms they are guarded with fine wire
outside the old glass, which is misty with innumerable names scratched
all over it. Poets and princes, wise men and foolish, have scrawled
their names after a silly fashion, on windows, wall, and ceiling of that
oak-floored room, because, on the 22d of April, 1564, a ba