y, with "Bonny Doon" hitched to the horse block, and being full of
"distempering draughts," as Shakspeare modestly terms it, and malicious
bravery in the midst of the great storm, late in the evening he mounted
his half-starved and as near frozen mare, to go home.

"Better stay all night, captain," coaxed some friend.

"Hills are icy, and hollows filled with snow," suggested the landlord.

"I wouldn't ride out to your place to-night, captain, for a seat in
Congress!" rejoined the first speaker.

"Ye wouldn't?" replied the captain. "And--and no wonder ye wouldn't, fer
not a divil iv ye's iver had the horse as could carry ye's over me road
th' night. Look at that! There's the baste can do it!--d'ye see that?"
and as the old man, reeling in the saddle, jammed the rowels of his
heavy spurs into the flanks of the mare, she nearly stood erect, and
chafed her bits as fiery and mettled as though just from her oats and
warm stable, and fifteen years kicked off.

"Boys," bawled the captain, "here's the ould mare that can thravel up a
frozen mountain, slide down a greased rainbow, and carry ould Captain
Maguire where the very ould divil himsilf couldn't vinture his dirty
ould body. Hoo-o-oo-oop! I'm gone, boys!"

And he was off, gone, too; for the old man never reached the threshold
of his domicil.--Next morning Captain Maguire was found in the mill-dam,
entirely dead, with poor "Bonny Doon," nearly frozen, and scarcely able
to walk or move, standing near him. But there she stood, upon the narrow
icy way over the dam, and from appearances of the snow and planks of the
little bridge, the faithful mare had pawed, scraped, and endeavored by
various means to rescue her master. The manner of the catastrophe was
evident; the old man had become sleepy, and frozen, and while the poor
mare was feeling her way over the icy and snow-covered bridge, her
master had slipped off into the frozen dam, and no doubt she would have
dragged him out, could she have reached him. As it was, she stood a
faithful sentinel over her lost master, and did not survive him
long,--the cold and her evident sorrow ended the eventful life of "Bonny
Doon."

Getting into the "Right Pew."

New Year's day is some considerable "pumpkins" in many parts of the
United States. In the Western States, they have horse-racing,
shooting-matches, quilting-frolics and grand hunting parties. In the
South, the week beginning with Christmas and ending with New Year's d