Yet remote from any teens;
I have learnt from Neighbor Nelly
What the girls' doll instinct means.

Oh! to see her with the baby!
(He adores her more than I);
How she choruses his crowing,
How she hushes every cry!
How she loves to pit his dimples
With her light forefinger deep;
How she boasts, as one in triumph,
When she gets him off to sleep!

We must part, my Neighbor Nelly,
For the summers quickly flee;
And the middle-aged admirer
Must, too soon, supplanted be.
Yet, as jealous as a mother,
A suspicious, cankered churl,
I look vainly for the setting,
To be worthy such a pearl!

NOTE.--This charming little gem is not original,
being gleaned from the pages of Putnam's Magazine.
As it was there published anonymously, the author
is unable to make any further acknowledgment.

POSTSCRIPT TO THE THREE STORIES.

BY THE OLD BACHELOR.

WHEN I had finished copying out the stories of the Big Boy and the Fat
Gentleman last summer, the thought struck me that, as I had been in town
all the warm bright June weather, it would do my health a great deal of
good to take a trip to Long Branch. Of course, it was not to see
Neighbor Nelly--certainly not.

So, the very next Saturday afternoon I dusted up my valise, and put some
nice cool summer clothes in it, and a great paper of candy, which I
meant for my little neighbors, in case I should see them by accident!
Somebody had told me that the Mansion House was the best hotel to stop
at. Shall I tell you why? Because there was a party there, of a papa and
mamma, a dear little girl and boy, and a remarkably nice little toy
terrier, which would put me in mind very much of some friends of mine
called Lawson. In fact, this family was called Lawson, too, and the
younger members were christened Nelly and Jimmy! Comical, wasn't it?

If you have never been to Long Branch, you can't think what a pleasant
sail it is down the Bay in the "Thomas Collyer," and how much I enjoyed
my trip. The pleasant shores of Long and Staten Islands (_I_ used to
live on Staten Island, and had some comical times there, which I mean to
write out one of these days) looked as verdant and beautiful as ever;
the sea was as blue as a bluebottle fly, and the sun as