means to starve to death, trying to be a lawyer, without any talent for
it. Let us keep in our own proper spheres."

The company hoped he would say more, but Dr. Parrot here began to
exercise again, in order to keep his digestion good, and the rest
dispersed.

THE BOBOLINK AND THE OWL.

Having eaten his breakfast of beech-nuts, a bobolink thought he would
show himself neighborly; so he hopped over to an old gloomy oak tree,
where there sat a hooting owl, and after bowing his head gracefully, and
waving his tail in the most friendly manner, he began chirruping
cheerily, somewhat in this fashion:

"Good-morning, Mr. Owl! what a fine bright morning we have."

"Fine!" groaned the owl, "fine, indeed! I don't see how you can call it
fine with that fierce sun glaring in one's eyes."

The bobolink was quite disconcerted by this outburst, but after jumping
about nervously from twig to twig for a while, he began again:

"What a beautiful meadow that is which you can see from your south
window! How sweet the flowers look! Really you have a pleasant view, if
your house is a little gloomy."

"Beautiful! did you say? Pleasant! What sort of taste you must have! I
haven't been able to look out of that window since May. The color of the
grass is too bright, and the flowers are very painful. I don't mind that
view so much in November, but this morning I must find a shadier place,
where the light won't disturb my morning nap."

And so, with a complaining "Hoo! hoo! hoo-ah!" he flapped his melancholy
wings and flitted away into the depths of a swamp.

And a waggish old squirrel, who had heard the conversation, asked the
bobolink how he could expect any one to like beautiful things who looked
out of such great staring eyes.

The pleasantness of our surroundings depends far more upon the eyes we
see with, than upon the objects about us.

THE END.

-----------------------------------

THE HOOSIER SCHOOL-BOY.

By EDWARD EGGLESTON,

Author of "The Hoosier Schoolmaster," etc.

_With full page Illustrations._ 1 vol., 12mo $1.00

Mr. Eggleston is one of the very few American novelists who have
succeeded in giving to their work a genuine savor of the soil, a
distinctively American character. His _Roxy, Hoosier Schoolmaster,
Circuit Rider_, and the rest, are home-spun