ss. When men can find any other instance of a poisonous drug
which is suitable for daily consumption, they will be more consistent
in using this. When it is admitted to be innocuous to those who are in
training for athletic feats, it may be possible to suppose it beneficial
to those who are out of training. Meanwhile there seems no ground for
its supporters except that to which the famous Robert Hall was reduced,
as he says, by "the Society of Doctors of Divinity." He sent a message
to Dr. Clarke, in return for a pamphlet against tobacco, that he could
not possibly refute his arguments and could not possibly give up
smoking.

* * * * *

THE WOLVES.

Ye who listen to stories told,
When hearths are cheery and nights are cold,

Of the lone wood-side, and the hungry pack
That howls on the fainting traveller's track,--

Flame-red eyeballs that waylay,
By the wintry moon, the belated sleigh,--

The lost child sought in the dismal wood,
The little shoes and the stains of blood

On the trampled snow,--O ye that hear,
With thrills of pity or chills of fear,

Wishing some angel had been sent
To shield the hapless and innocent,--

Know ye the fiend that is crueller far
Than the gaunt gray herds of the forest are?

Swiftly vanish the wild fleet tracks
Before the rifle and woodman's axe:

But hark to the coming of unseen feet,
Pattering by night through the city street!

Each wolf that dies in the woodland brown
Lives a spectre and haunts the town.

By square and market they slink and prowl,
In lane and alley they leap and howl.

All night they snuff and snarl before
The poor patched window and broken door.

They paw the clapboards and claw the latch,
At every crevice they whine and scratch.

Their tongues are subtle and long and thin,
And they lap the living blood within.

Icy keen are the teeth that tear,
Red as ruin the eyes that glare.

Children crouched in corners cold
Shiver in tattered garments old,

And start from sleep with bitter pangs
At the touch of the phantoms' viewless fangs.

Weary the mother and worn with strife,
Still she watches and fights for life.

But her hand is feeble, and weapon small:
One little needle against them all!

In evil hour the daughter fled
From her poor shelter and wretched bed.

Through the city's pitiless solitude
To the door of sin the w