al work, if all the pleasant anticipations and lively hopes of
youth remain but as cotton fabrics do when the colors have washed away,
if good intention and noble purpose glimmer only a little now and then
from out the murky environments of your lot, as fisher lights at sea,
accept the inevitable and make the best of it. Nothing can stop us if
we are bound to grow. We are not like trees that can be hewed down by
every chance woodman's axe; death is the only woodman abroad for us,
and he does not hew down, he simply transplants. God is our only
judge; to him alone shall we yield the record of life's troubled day,
and isn't it a great comfort to think that he so fully understands what
have been our limitations, and how we have been handicapped and baffled
and hindered? If jockeys were to enter their horses for the great
Derby with the understanding that the road was rough and the horses
blind, do you think much would be expected of the finish? And is
heaven less discriminating than a horse jockey?

LIII.

THE "SMART" PERSON.

Next to a steam calliope preserve me from a "smart" person. There is
as much difference between smartness and brain as there is between a
jewsharp and a flute, or between mustard and wine. A "smart" person
may turn off a lot of work and make things hum, so does a buzz-saw!
Who would not rather spend an afternoon with a lark than with a hornet?
The lark may not be so active, but activity is not always the most
desirable thing in the world. A smart person may accomplish more than
a dreamer, but in the long run I'll take my chance with the latter.
When we go up to St. Peter's gate by and by, after life's long,
blundering march is over, it will not be the answer to such questions
as this: "How many socks can you darn in an afternoon, besides baking
bread, washing windows, tending babies and scrubbing floors?" that is
going to help us; but, "How many times have you stopped your work to
bind up a broken heart, or say a comforting word, or help carry a
burden for somebody worse off than yourself?" I tell you, smart folks
never have the time to be sympathetic; they always have too much
thundering work on hand.

LIV.

A PRETTY STREET INCIDENT.

The other day a horse was trying to get a very small quantity of oats
from the depths of a very small nosebag. In vain the poor fellow
tossed his head and did his best to gain his dinner. At last, just as
he was settling down to dumb and