* *

There are many delightful articles which must be merely alluded to in
passing, as the "Old Salem Shops," by Eleanor Putnam, so delicate and
delicious that, once read, it will ever be a fragrant memory; Louise
Stockton's "Woman in the Restaurant" I want to give you, and Mrs.
Barrow's "Pennikitty People;" a chapter from Miss Baylor's "On This
Side," and the opening chapters of Miss Phelps's "Old Maids' Paradise;"
also the description of "Joppa," by Grace Denio Litchfield, in "Only an
Incident." There are others from which it is not possible to make
extracts. Miss Woolson's admirable "For the Major," though pathetic,
almost tragic, in its underlying feeling, is, at the same time, a story
of exquisite humor, from which, nevertheless, not a single sentence
could be quoted that would be called "funny." Her work, and that of
Frances Hodgson Burnett, as well as that of Miss Phelps and Mrs.
Spofford, shine with a silver thread of humor, worked too intimately
into the whole warp and woof to be extracted without injuring both the
solid material and the tinsel. To appreciate the point and delicacy of
their finest wit, you must read the whole story and grasp the entire
character or situation.

Mrs. E.W. Bellamy, a Southern lady, published in last year's _Atlantic
Monthly_ a sketch called "At Bent's Hotel," which ought to have a place
in this volume; but my publisher says authoritatively that there must be
a limit somewhere; so this gem must be included in--a second series!

* * * * *

There is so much truth as well as humor in the following article, that
it must be included. It gives in prose the agonies which Saxe told so
feelingly in verse:

A FATAL REPUTATION.

BY ISABEL FRANCES BELLOWS.

I am impelled to write this as an awful warning to young men and women
who are just entering upon life and its responsibilities. Years ago I
thoughtlessly took a false step, which at the time seemed trivial and of
little import, but which has since assumed colossal proportions that
threaten to overshadow much of the innocent happiness of my otherwise
placid existence. What wonder, then, that I try to avert this danger
from young and inexperienced minds who in their gay thoughtlessness rush
into the very jaws of the disaster, and before they are well aware find
they are entrapped for life, as there is no escape for those who have
thus brought their doom upon themselves.

I will try and rela