ery little work at the office that afternoon, and
when I reached home I handed the package of calico to my wife. She
unrolled it and exclaimed:

"Why, this doesn't match the piece I gave you!"

"Match it!" I cried. "Oh no! it doesn't match it. You didn't want
that matched. You were mistaken. What you wanted was Turkey
red--third counter to the left. I mean, Turkey red is what they use!"

My wife looked at me in amazement, and then I detailed to her my
troubles.

"Well," said she, "this Turkey red is a great deal prettier than what I
had, and you've bought so much of it that I needn't use the other at
all. I wish I had thought of Turkey red before."

"I wish from my heart you had!" said I.

THE CHRISTMAS WRECK

"Well, sir," said old Silas, as he gave a preliminary puff to the pipe
he had just lighted, and so satisfied himself that the draught was all
right, "the wind's a-comin', an' so's Christmas. But it's no use bein'
in a hurry fur either of 'em, fur sometimes they come afore you want
'em, anyway."

Silas was sitting in the stern of a small sailing-boat which he owned,
and in which he sometimes took the Sandport visitors out for a sail,
and at other times applied to its more legitimate but less profitable
use, that of fishing. That afternoon he had taken young Mr. Nugent for
a brief excursion on that portion of the Atlantic Ocean which sends its
breakers up on the beach of Sandport. But he had found it difficult,
nay, impossible, just now, to bring him back, for the wind had
gradually died away until there was not a breath of it left. Mr.
Nugent, to whom nautical experiences were as new as the very nautical
suit of blue flannel which he wore, rather liked the calm. It was such
a relief to the monotony of rolling waves. He took out a cigar and
lighted it, and then he remarked:

"I can easily imagine how a wind might come before you sailors might
want it, but I don't see how Christmas could come too soon."

"It come wunst on me when things couldn't `a' looked more onready fur
it," said Silas.

"How was that?" asked Mr. Nugent, settling himself a little more
comfortably on the hard thwart. "If it's a story, let's have it. This
is a good time to spin a yarn."

"Very well," said old Silas. "I'll spin her."

The bare-legged boy whose duty it was to stay forward and mind the jib
came aft as soon as he smelt a story, and took a nautical position,
which was duly studied by Mr. Nugent, on