compassion
Gave me the gift of song.
Because I had loved so vainly
And sung with such faltering breath,
The Master in infinite mercy
Offers the boon of death.

A RETORT TURKISH.

The following we take to be of Turkish origin:

"As a woman was walking, a man looked at and followed her.

"'Why,' said she, 'do you follow me?'

"'Because,' he replied, 'I have fallen in love with you.'

"'Why so? My sister, who is coming after me, is much handsomer than I am.
Go and make love to her.'

"The man turned back, and saw a woman with an ugly face, and, being
greatly displeased, returned, and said:

"'Why should you tell me a falsehood?'

"The woman answered 'Neither did you tell _me_ the truth; for, if you were
in love with _me_, why did you look back for another woman?'"

FLASHES OF ROYAL REPARTEE.

While there is no royal road to cleverness, the real road, such as it is,
frequently is traveled by royal feet. In these days the functions of
royalty are not of a nature that is likely to develop merry dispositions.

Rich in sly humor was the reply of Henry IV of France, who one day reached
Amiens after a prolonged journey. A local orator was deputed to harangue
him, and commenced with a lengthy string of epithets:

"Very great sovereign, very good, very merciful, very magnanimous----"

"Add also," interrupted the weary monarch, "very tired."

The same king, who appears to have been a constant sufferer from the
stupid orations of these wordy windbags, was listening to a speech in a
small country town, when an ass brayed at a distance.

"Pardon me, gentlemen," said the witty sovereign; "one at a time, please."

Henry's minister, Sully, was a Protestant, and happening to hear that a
famous physician had quitted Calvinism for Catholicism, the king said to
him:

"My friend, your religion is in a bad way--the doctors give it up."

George III was the author of many clever sayings. Meeting Lord Kenyon at a
levee soon after that eminent justice had been guilty of an extraordinary
explosion of ill humor in the Court of King's Bench, the king remarked to
him:

"My lord chief justice, I hear that you have lost your temper, and from my
great regard for you I am glad to hear it, for I hope you will find a
better one."

On another occasion, when coming out of the House of Lords after opening
the session, he said to the lord chancellor:

"Did I deliver the speech well?"

"Very well in