e starboard
quarter hung the beautiful clipper, gliding along smoothly and easily,
one great pyramid of snow-white canvas from gunwale to truck, while the
look-out and the two men at the wheel (the only persons visible on
board) grinned from ear to ear at the "Britisher's" vain efforts. Just
as the clipper passed, the Stars and Stripes fluttered out jauntily at
her peak.

"Come, boys!" cried Herrick; "let's give the old 'gridiron' a cheer."

Mingling with the hearty shout that followed (in which Frank joined with
a will) came three sharp blasts from the _Arizona_'s steam-whistle, by
way of salute. Instantly the clipper's crew sprang up from behind the
bulwarks, and, waving their caps, sent back a rousing cheer, answered by
the Englishman with a short whistle of defiance as he swept by.

Little by little the racers, still close together, melted into the
fast-falling shadows of night; but there were not a few who declared
that, when last seen, the clipper was getting the best of it, and their
belief in the superiority of wind over steam was greatly strengthened
thereby.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

APRIL'S TEARS.

April's tears are happy tears.
Joy when the arbutus sweet
Creeps about her dancing feet,
When the violet appears,
When the birds begin to sing,
When the grass begins to grow,
Makes her lovely eyes o'erflow.
She's a tender-hearted thing,
Bonny daughter of the spring.

BILLY'S GREAT SPEECH.

BY WILLIAM O. STODDARD.

Billy was the youngest member of the debating society; that is, the
other members were all grown-up men, though none of them were very old,
and he was not yet quite fourteen years of age. Some of the boys he knew
told him he had been let in by mistake, and some said it was a joke; but
there he was, week after week, every Friday evening, sitting on a front
bench, and as much a member as the president, or the secretary, or
either of the three vice-presidents.

One of the names of that village debating society was "The Lyceum," but
it wasn't much used, except when they had distinguished strangers to
lecture for them, and charged twenty-five cents apiece for tickets.

The regular weekly debates were "free," and so there was always a good
attendance. The ladies, of all ages, were sure to come, and a good many
of the boys. Billy never missed a debate; but he had not yet made so
much as one single solitary speech on any subject. Nobody knew how often
he had