tender parents. He told him of a loving
mother who yet sorrowed for him, and of a little blue-eyed sister, who
would rejoice when he came. Carl listened, and wondered, and laughed,
and when he comprehended it all, slid from his father's arms and ran to
embrace old Leon.

The next morning early General Wallenstein, after having generously
rewarded the innkeeper and his wife for having given a home, though a
poor one, to his little son, departed for Basle. In his arms he
carried Carl, carefully wrapped in his warm fur cloak, and if sometimes
the little bare feet of the child were thrust out from their covering,
it was only to bury themselves in the shaggy coat of old Leon, who lay
snugly curled up in the bottom of the carriage.

I will not attempt to tell you of the deep joy of Carl's mother, nor of
the wild delight of his little sister, for I think such things are
quite beyond any one's telling; but altogether it was to the
Wallensteins a Christmas-time to thank God for, and they did thank him.

A CHARADE.

My _first_ the softest, loveliest grace
Nature to beauty gives;
While love and truth and modesty
Stay in the heart, it lives.

My _second_ is so like my first,
My first its shadow seems;
It sweetens all the sunny day,
All night in fragrance dreams.

My _whole_, sweet one, I love to trace,
Soft glowing in that tell-tale face,
When Arthur whispers in your ear
Those "nothings" I must never hear:
Ah! then it comes, all warm and clear,
Your answering blush, Rose, my dear.

_Blush-rose._

ABOUT SOME ITALIAN CHILDREN.

GIUSEPPE AND LUCIA.

In a little mountain town not far from the beautiful lake of Como, in
the North of Italy, in the early part of the last war between the
Austrians and the Italians, a poor peasant-woman lay dying. Beside her
bed stood a fine, sturdy-looking lad, some fourteen years of age,
listening reverently to the last words of his mother. On the bed, with
her face hidden against that dear mother's breast, lay a little girl of
six or seven, trying to keep down her sobs, and to take into her
half-broken little heart the fond farewells, the tender and solemn
advice of the beloved one who was going home to God.

The dying mother grieved to leave her poor children alone in the world,
for they were fatherless, and had no near relatives; but she believed
that the same Heavenly Father who was calling her from them would care
for them a