Truman has done much better since he pulled the fence down; and don't you know that just as soon as he could walk he went over to Mr. Faulkner's and told him about the affair, and offered to work for him after school hours and Saturdays to pay for the damage." 'That was Tal's work, I know." "Well, if it was, I'm sure it shows that Truman is not so careless and bad as we've thought." "Well," rejoined Milly, in a tone much softened, "I suppose if he does his part well, Miss Grace will be very much pleased, and people around here will compliment her on her success. I'm sure I like her." "I think she's lovely!" exclaimed Sophie," and does just about right." "I shall do what I have to anyway, Burr or no Burr." "Well, ask it quickly, as lunch must be waiting." "Yer see, Mil- Miss Milly, I'd heard that some of the gals didn't like it, 'cause I'm goin' ter speak at the school-closin', It's all Tal Manley's fault; and when I said I'd try, Miss Grace said she'd be glad to have me, and there I was just stuck. Now, I aint agoin' to speak 't all if anybody's against it; and I've come to ask yer if yer've any objections." Why, Tru," replied Milly in so gentle a voice, that she felt half angry with herself for so much condescension after all the pride and even contempt she had usually shown toward this boy, “I'm sure you have my consent." "Much obliged, Miss Milly. If ye'r on my side I guess I sha'n't trouble my "I suppose you're coming to me now is Tal's work too?" returned the young lady with an accent of sarcasm. Truman reddened with sudden anger, as he said: "Yer can just think what you please, but I've come on this business myself, and I reckon I—” "So shall I, of course. Good-bye," saying which Sophie tripped down the avenue, while Milly walked a little pen-self 'bout the rest." sively over the velvety lawn to the hall door. She called to mind, perhaps, some of the stories she had read of rude, mischievous boys who were neglected by their parents, they appearing to see in them only occasions for criticism and harsh rebuke, so that they were compelled to find at school or in the street agreeable companionship for the freedom they enjoyed; and being fortunate in happening to fall in with one or more associates who could pity them and give them a kind word now and then, they at length showed that there were good and noble traits under the rough surface, and these being developed, made useful and really eminent men of them. Whatever she was thinking about, she had only set a foot upon the first step of the piazza when a call from the gate broke in upon her reverie. "Say, Milly?" Turning around, who should she see running up the walk but the very boy who had been the subject of her talk with Sophie. The old disdainful spirit almost took possession of her, as she asked with some impatience : "Oh, please excuse me. I am sorry that I said that." "All right," responded the boy, his face clearing at once of the frown. "Tal's one of the cleverest chaps of his size I ever knowed; but Truman Burr don't never want any promptin' from anybody' to do some things. Well, I won't bother yer any longer." Saying which he turned on his heel. "Won't you have some cherries?" asked Milly, who was a little anxious to atone for her unfortunate question. "We've some fine black tartarians left, and if you will wait a few minutes you shall have some." "Those big black fellows like what Deacon Scott has got in his court-yard ? ” "I think so." "Well, if yer don't mind the trouble, 1881.] "SOMETHING HAS GONE WRONG." 203 I'll take a few," said Truman, settling a bad girl after all, if she was so powerhimself on the piazza-steps. Milly ran into the house and peered into the pantry, soon finding a dish of the luscious fruit which had been freshly picked. Procuring a bit of paper, she wrapped two or three generous handfuls of the cherries in it and hastened out to Truman. "These, I hope, you will find nice." "Thank yer. I guess I will, for I'm kinder death on cherries; so's Tip. She's down with a fever, and the doctor says fruit's good for her. Guess I'll take 'em home for her after tryin' the smack of one or two myself." "Tip's one of your sisters, I think?” "Yes. She jest keeled over on Wednesday with rimmittin' or some other kind of fever." "I am very sorry. I'll ask mamma to send some fruit over to her to-morrow." "Tip 'ill like it, yer can bet. Goodbye." Truman's reflections on his way home were to the effect that Milly wasn't such ful stuck-up and sassy, and that a fellow did gain something worth having by trying to get on the right side of people. Milly, on her side, re-entered the house and sat down to her lunch so thoughtfully, that her mother remarked: "It seems to me, Milly, you have put on a close-fitting thinking-cap this afternoon." "SOMETHING HAS GONE WRONG." WHY, that's not four o'clock! I'm certain that it can not be so late!" exclaimed Minny, starting from the seat on which she had been amusing herself with a book, while her work lay neglected beside her. "I looked at the great clock not ten minutes ago, and I'm sure that the long hand had not reached quarter past three." "Oh! did you not know that something was the matter with the great clock?" replied her aunt, who, with her bonnet and shawl on, had just come down-stairs, prepared to accompany her on a walk. "Since yesterday it has gone quite wrong; it strikes one hour, and points to another. I think that the hands must be loose." "Something has gone wrong, indeed!" cried the child, with impatience, "and I will never trust it again." She looked up, and saw a quiet smile on the face of the lady. "Aunt, what are you thinking of?" she asked quickly. CLARE. Her aunt glanced down at the unfinished seam, from which the needle and thread hung dangling down. "Did you not promise to have that ready before four?" said she. "Yes," replied Minny, looking a little ashamed; "but-but—” "But there is somebody, I fear, besides the great clock whose hands are in fault; who is swift to promise, and slow to perform-whose words say one thing, and whose actions say another. Shall I repeat your own words, Minny, and say, something has gone wrong, indeed, and I never will trust her again?" Keep this in mind, young reader, that our words and our actions should agree together, as the hands of a good clock with the chime of its bell. Never make a promise rashly; but, if once made, let no pleasure, no feeling of indolence, tempt you for one moment to break it. COLD WATER-NOTHING ELSE! "Do you really think, doctor, you ever it can not so use has the opposite tendency. Water-organized water-enters largely into the composition of the organic tis can cure everything with cold water alone? While ready to admit that cold water is good in its place, in many cases I think something more issues. Hence the demand for water in needed. At any rate I should not feel quite safe to trust it alone in the more severe and critical forms of disease." With this view of yours, my friend, I fully coincide. In many cases-in almost all cases indeed-cold water is not only insufficient, but it is too often positively injurious. The idea that we use it as a universal panacea is based upon a misconception of our theories. This misconception has led you into a very generally prevalent error-an error as to the value we place upon water without regard to temperature, and an error equally great in regard to temperature. All healing power resides in vital force -the life principle within us. When vital action is disturbed we are sick. Whatever brings about its disturbance is a cause of disease. When all the demands of vital force are met we are in perfect health. When they are not met we are sick in a degree corresponding to the deficiency. The play of this force is not confined to the elaboration of water alone, of air alone, or of food alone. Whatever it can use for the benefit of our bodies is health-preserving, healthpromoting, and health-restoring; what proportionate quantities for the sustenance of the body. Its value depends upon the extent and variety of its uses in the vital economy. As a chemical constituent of all organic structures, as a diluent of the vital fluids, as a deobstruent of the skin as well as of the internal organs, as a regulator of temperature and a soother of pain and of nervous irritability, when wisely used, it stands unrivaled. But this by no means justifies the conclusion that it is a universal panacea, or a panacea at all. Only they who know very little of the true theory of life and health can so estimate it. While recognizing the value of water in health and disease, and of temperature as modifying its utility, we are not to overlook the agency of other things equally important. Water can not take the place of food, nor compensate for errors in its preparation, or in the time and manner of using it. If we eat to excess or eat too little ; if we eat bad food, or if we eat too often, or not often enough; if we eat when either physical or mental conditions are unfavorable to good digestion, disorder will be sure to follow. 1881.] A CHINESE LADY'S FOOT. It requires no extraordinary breadth of intellect to see that the remedy for such disorder is not to be found in cold water, or in water of any temperature. Life and health depend upon a combination of many and diverse influences. We have referred to food which meets the demands of nutrition. We could not long live without it. All the tissues would waste and vital force would waste with them. But food, important as it is, does not occupy the first place among things necessary to life and health. We may live twenty or thirty days without it. Dr. Tanner lived forty days. Without air, we could not live as many minutes. Complete suspension of the respiratory function for three to five minutes is usually fatal. Insufficient respiration or the breathing of impure air, or of air deficient in oxygen, though it may be less speedy, is always hurtful in proportion to the extent of its departure from the normal standard: Bad ventilation, bad positions of body, tight clothing, and other causes of defective breathing, can WH 205 not be corrected, or their bad effects compensated for, by the application of water cold or warm, internally or externally, much or little. The human body is a complicated machine. It is subject to a great variety of influences favorable and unfavorable to health. The study of these influences, the supplying of favorable, and the removing of unfavorable conditions, is the province of the intelligent and conscientious physician. His field is a wide one, embracing a thorough knowledge of the human body and of the laws to which it is subject physically and mentally. Nothing short of this can fully meet the demands of his office. Need more be said to satisfy any one that his work embraces a much wider range than the cold-water idea gives him credit for ? or must we concede the claim that drugs which poison and derange the body, if taken in health, are useful and necessary in sickness, because we think that cold water alone is insufficient? We do not so see it. A CHINESE LADY'S FOOT. J. S. GALLOWAY, M.D. WHO has not expressed some curios- | it is only the Upper Ten among the ity with regard to the appearance daughters of China that indulge in the of the little feet of Chinese ladies? We have, and although impressed that their naked deformity could be little or nothing short of disgusting, we nevertheless should be glad to have an opportunity for an inspection. A naval correspondent favored the publishers of the Scientific American with photographic views of the "golden lily," as the Chinese lady calls her compressed and distorted foot, from which the accompanying illustrations were engraved. They show the foot in the bandaged and bare conditions. The correspondent writes that "It is an error to suppose, as many do, that A CHINESE LADY'S FOOT. luxury of 'golden lilies,' as it is extremely common among every class, even to the very poorest-notably the poor sewing women one sees in every Chinese city and town, who can barely manage to hobble from house to house seeking work. The pain endured while under the operation is so severe and continuous that the poor girls never sleep for long periods without the aid of strong narcotics, and then only but fitfully; and it is from this constant suffering that the peculiar sullen or stolid look so often seen on the woman's face is derived." Successive layers of bandages are used till the strip is all used, and the end is then sewn tightly down. The foot is so squeezed upward that, in walking, only the ball of the great toe touches the ground. After a month the foot is put in hot water to soak some time; then the bandage is carefully unwound, much dead cuticle coming off with it. Frequently, too, one or two toes may even drop off, in which case the woman feels afterward repaid by having smaller and more delicate feet. Each time the bandage is taken off, the foot is kneaded to make the up again as quickly as possible with a fresh bandage, which is drawn up more tightly. During the first year the pain is so intense that the sufferer can do. nothing, and for about two years the foot aches continually, and is the seat of a pain which is like the pricking of sharp needles. With continued rigorous bind The process by which the foot is re-joints more flexible, and is then bound duced in size is related by Miss Norwood, an American missionary resident at Swatow, and is substantially as follows: The binding of the feet is not begun until the child has learnt to walk. The bandages are specially manufactured, and are about two inches wide and two yards long for the first year, five yards long for subsequent years. The end of the strip is laiding the foot in two years becomes dead on the inside of the foot at the instep, then carried over the toes, under the foot, and round the heel, the toes being thus drawn toward and over the sole, while a bulge is produced on the instep, and a deep indentation in the sole. and ceases to ache, and the whole leg, from the knee downward, becomes shrunk, so as to be little more than skin and bone. The origin of this strange fashion is a complete mystery, at least to western civilization. THE CURIOUS INDUSTRIES, WITH A CAUTION OR TWO. 'HE work of the staff of officers ap- | known as Prussian blue, but only a few pointed by the superintendent of the firms manufacture it, and the new call census to collect statistics relating to the for old shoes was evidently for some othindustries and manufactures of New York er purpose. In New York city and Brookcity is, according to the Evening Post, lyn about three million pairs of old shoes approaching completion, and will show are thrown away every year. Formerly a very satisfactory growth since 1870. old shoes were plentiful in the gutters of certain neighborhoods; now it appears that they are sought after as choice prizes in the rag-picker's line. By dint of persevering inquiry, it was discovered that the old shoes were used for three purposes. First, all shoes not completely worn out are patched, greased, and after being otherwise regenerated, sold to men who deal in such wares. Some persons. wear one shoe much more than the other; these dealers find mates for shoes In the course of the investigation by the gentleman who has charge of it, Mr. Hill, and his deputies, some singular industries were brought to light. It was found, for instance, that some use was made of old shoes, but exactly what use was hard to find out. Large numbers of old shoes were sold by rag-pickers to certain men who disposed of them at a good price. It is well known that bits of old leather make the commercial article |