proached in fear, until one, bolder than the rest, stabbed it with a
pitchfork, when the sighing sound, made by the out-rushing gas, only
confirmed their conviction that it was endowed with life. In vain did
the village _cure_ try to dissuade them, and when at last the silk bag
lay flat and 'lifeless' on the ground, they tied it to a horse's tail
and set him galloping through the field. With wild excitement they
followed in chase, till hardly a shred of poor M. Charles's
carefully-built balloon remained to be trodden on.

When the country folk were so ignorant as this, we can hardly be
surprised to read that the Government soon found it advisable to make
Montgolfier's discovery widely known, so as to allay 'the terror which
it might otherwise excite among the people.'

JOHN LEA.

MY GARDEN CONCERT.

I hear a splendid concert in my garden every day,
When the breezes find by grove and lawn some instrument to play;
They shake the shiny laurel with the clatter of the 'bones,'
And from the lofty sycamore draw deeper 'cello tones,
And giving thus the signal that the concert should begin,
The brook beside the pebbled path strikes up its mandoline.

Then all the garden wakes to sound, for not a bird is mute:
The robin pipes the piccolo; the blackbird plays the flute;
While high upon a cedar-top a thrush with bubbling throat
Lifts up to this accompaniment her clear soprano note.

Then by-and-by there softly sounds, beside some flowering tree
The oboe of the dancing gnat, the cornet of the bee.
Such tiny notes--and yet with ease their cadence I can trace,
While over-head some passing rook puts in his noisy bass,
Or from a green and shady copse, a daisied field away,
I hear the jarring discords of a magpie and a jay.

The Wind conducts the orchestra, and as he beats the time
The flood of music sinks and swells in melody sublime;
Till, when the darkness deepens and the sun sets in the West,
They all put up their instruments and settle down to rest;
And when I seek my slumber, like the daisy or the bird,
My rest is all the better for the concert I have heard.

THE LEGEND OF HELFENSTEIN.

A German version of an old story.

In former times there ruled at Olmuetz, in Moravia, a Duke who allowed
himself, when in anger, to do many cruel things. One day, Bruno, his
falconer, came trembling before his master and announced to