ly withdrawn thoroughly "marbled," and hung on a line to
dry.

In another corner of the room busy girls are applying gilding to covers
from packets of gold leaf; while elsewhere dozens of others are doing
different and equally interesting things, all belonging to the great
trade of book-binding.

At length our book, having passed through all these stages and
processes, is pronounced complete, and a date is set for its
"publication" or presentation to the public. On the day that it appears
half a dozen copies are sent to the author with compliments of the
publisher. If the author wishes any more copies of his book to present
to his admiring friends, he must buy them and pay for them like any one
else.

Thus the building of the book is finished, and it is launched on the
stormy sea of literature, to sink or swim according to whether or not it
has been constructed of poor material by incapable workmen, or has been
well and wisely built.

CLOTH OF GOLD.

Cloth of ermine covered
The earth awhile ago,
A royal robe on every hill;
In every valley low
The sparkle as of diamonds,
The sheen of dancing light,
And the world a fairy palace
By dawn and noon and night.

Cloth of gold is woven
To wrap the earth to-day,
With stars of many twinkling rays,
Broadcast upon the way.
The dandelions laughing,
The daisies coming soon,
And the world's a fairy palace
By morn and night and noon.

M. E. S.

ON BOARD THE ARK.[1]

BY ALBERT LEE.

CHAPTER I.

[Illustration: Decorative I]

t took a long time for Tommy Toddles to recover from the exquisite
sensation of surprise and wonder which clung to him after his strange
adventures with the Sheep and the ex-Pirate. He used to talk to his
Uncle Dick continually of what he had seen and done during that famous
afternoon, and many and many a time the two went out into the woods
together and searched through the bushes and the trees for the haunt of
the Loon, and for the lake by the side of which had stood the
Poor-house. But they never found anything; and Tommy was consequently
forced to sit at home and content himself with recollections and
reminiscences--"which are decidedly unsatisfactory substitutes," thought
he.

So it frequently happened that the little boy sat all alone in the big
room at the top of the house, and went over and over again in his mind
those peculiar incidents in which so many strange creat