your very kind notice, but your pretty puzzle is
so complimentary to ourselves that we can not print it.

* * * * *

EMMET M. L.--_The American_, your amateur paper, is very neatly printed,
and well made up.

* * * * *

MARIE L.--The extra number of brakes on Mount Washington steam-engines
is to increase the safety of the descent.

* * * * *

Sallie Floyd reports Japan quinces in bloom at Carthage, Missouri, on
March 7; Nellie Sands, of Lawrence, Kansas, writes that robins and
redbirds have lived all winter in the evergreens in her garden; "Henry,"
of Philadelphia, says the dandelions have been in bloom almost all the
time; and Lillie Cassiday writes that it snowed hard on March 14 and 18
in Winterset, Iowa--the only snow of the winter in that locality.

* * * * *

LIZZIE S. S.--You can make an AEolian harp of a box of thin pine. The box
should be the length of your window, about five inches broad, and three
deep. Put a row of hitch pins at one end, and tuning pins at the other,
and two narrow bridges of hard wood about two inches within the pins,
over which to stretch the strings. Eight strings will make a good harp.
They should be of catgut, and if you tune them in unison, the sound will
be sweeter than if they are tuned in thirds or fifths. The tension
should be rather slack. The ends of the box should be raised about an
inch above the strings to support a thin pine board upon which the
window rests. The draught of air passes over the strings stretched
midway between the upper board and the sound-board, which should have
two round holes cut in it. The harp will sound sweeter if placed in a
window which is struck obliquely by the wind.

* * * * *

Charlie Cubbery, Lizzie Brown, Blanche T. S., Grace Roberts, Lizzie
Falconer, and M. M. Coleman write pretty stories of gold-fish, canaries,
turtles, goats, and other pets, which we sincerely regret we have no
room to print.

* * * * *

PUZZLES FROM YOUNG CONTRIBUTORS.

No. 1.

ENIGMA.

My first is in swine, but not in cow.
My second is in quarrel, but not in row.
My third is in rip, but not in tear.
My fourth is in pretty, but not in fair.
My fifth is in herb, but not in root.
My sixth is in inch, but not in foot.
My seventh is in rake, but not in hoe.