hey place sentinels to watch, and give alarm. The eye, large and
brilliant, is a marked feature of the tribe. The word "antelope"
signifies "bright eyes."

Our picture shows us several young chamois, standing amid the crags and
chasms and precipices which they delight in. A chamois can descend in
two or three leaps a rock of twenty or thirty feet, without the smallest
projection on which to rest.

The horns of the full-grown chamois are quite black and smooth, and
formed like a perfect hook with very sharp points. These elegant
creatures are the only animals of the antelope kind to be found in
Western Europe. They choose for their home the loftiest mountains.

They dislike heat, and in the summer time they frequent the cold upper
regions of the everlasting hills,--either the lofty peaks, or those
valleys where the snow never melts. In the winter time, however, the
cold of those bleak solitudes seems too much for them, spite of their
long, hair and thick coat of fine wool; and they descend to the lower
regions. It is then, and only then, that the hunter has any chance of
capturing them.

[Illustration]

It is said they can scent a man a mile and a half off; and their
restlessness and suspicion are extreme. At the prospect of danger they
are off and away, racing at an incredible speed, scaling crags with the
most amazing agility, and leaving the pursuer far behind.

They are usually taken by a party of hunters, who surround the glen
where they are, and advance towards each other until the herd is hemmed
in on all sides.

The flesh of the antelope is like venison. No animal ought to yield
sweeter meat than the chamois, when we think what he feeds upon.
Mountain herbs and flowers, and tender shoots from tree and shrub--such
is his food. He drinks very little, but that little is sparkling water;
while the air which reddens his blood is the purest in the world.

UNCLE CHARLES.

THE GARDEN TOOLS.

[Illustration]

COME, hoe and shovel and rake,
From your winter nap awake!
The spring has come;
There's work to be done:
The birds are calling,
And off I must run
My little garden to make.

You have lain in the attic so long,
Perhaps you forget you belong
In the sunshine and air full half of the year;
And to leave you to mice and to cobwebs up here