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Published every Thursday. $5.00 a year in advance. Postage to foreign countries in the Postal Union, $1.04 a year, extra. Single copies, 10 cents. Back numbers can be had by applying at this office. Single copies of Vols. I. and II. out of print. Vol. I., bound, $30.00; Vol. II., bound, $15.00. Back numbers, one year old, 25 cents per copy. Vols. III. to XVI., inclusive, bound or in flat numbers, at $10.00 per volume.

Subscribers wishing address changed will greatly facilitate matters by sending old address as well as new.

Rejected contributions will be destroyed unless accompanied by a stamped and directed envelope.

IT is edifying to watch how one notoriety succeeds

another in the public eye, as though the world

were a great dime museum, with a management bent on holding public attention by a judicious change of "freaks." About the beginning of the year, it will be remembered, Senator Hill occupied a prominent place in the exhibition. The Manhattan Club supper and his triumphant advance on Washington made him a very valuable "attraction" to the managers. The figures of Edward Field and Russell Sage were moved back to make room for him, and he kept a good place for nearly two months. During that time he divided public attention with such notable curiosities as Harvard's D. K. E. and Patrick Egan, both of which were exhibited in the full performance of their eccentric functions without depriving him of a considerable, though waning, share of public attention. He held on pretty well until Washington's birthday, and might have kept his place a little longer if the sudden development of superior claims by Perry, the express robber, had not relegated him to the back row. Perry scarcely lasted the traditional nine days, and during that short interval was hard pushed for precedence in the show by Judge Maynard, Dr. Parkhurst and the Deacon family. Lieut. Hetherington got one of the front places for a few days, but was quickly supplanted by Dr. Parkhurst again, who returned to the show after a brief absence with Jay Gould under one arm and District Attorney Nicoll under the other. Since then Mr. Godkin has been exhibited as the man who was arrested before eight o'clock on Sunday morning, and has stirred considerable enthusiasm as a surviving victim of the brutality of the New York police.

TH

HE very latest attraction in the New York branch of the show (keep moving there, please, ladies and gentlemen, so that everybody can see) is Mr. Harry Vane Milbank, a really and sincerely British fire-eater, warranted to digest lead bullets. He is absolutely genuine, as any one can ascertain by noting the name blown in the glass. Mr. Milbank's affidavits certify that he has fought more duels than he has teeth, and has slain more antagonists on the field of honor than he can count on such fingers as he has left. Note this peculiarity about this remarkable man. Observe that on the other figures in the show, in particular on the figure of Senator Hill, some flies have settled. But on Mr. Milbank there are no flies. Flies do not dare to alight on this obstreperous gentleman.

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TAK

AKE a look at Mr. Milbank while you have the chance. His engagement promises to be cut unexpectedly short. Since reaching New York he has learned that private matters of much moment, in which he was prominently concerned, have been divulged, thereby bringing serious annoyance upon a respectable family, and putting a young bachelor who enjoys Mr. Milbank's intimacy in an exceedingly ridiculous and undesirable position. A gentleman in Paris and another in London are responsible for this divulgence which Mr. Milbank resents, and he is going right back to Europe to knock their heads together and ask them what they meant. Both gentlemen go about with their clothes full of explosives which are liable to go off if subjected to any unusual concussion. This makes Mr. Milbank's errand somewhat perilous, and persons who desire to see him to advantage had better step up and look at him now, as there may be some flies on him when he is next shown.

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LET joy be unconfined

among the liquor dealers

at Chicago!

Also let there be rejoicing among the proprietors of beer gardens and of all manner of side shows.

It appears that the New York exhibit at the World's Fair is to be closed Sundays. If the entire exhibition is closed on that day it will be the very best thing that could happen for the bar rooms and moral enterprises of a kindred nature. Those sanguine rustics who believe that the thousands of strangers suddenly thrown upon their own resources are going to rush to the churches because the fair is closed, make not only a

AN AFFAIR DE CUR.

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BOOKISTMUS

SOMETHING ABOUT THE FOOL'S PURGATORY.

THERE

has just been published a beautiful little book of stories and sketches, by F. Hopkinson Smith, entitled, "A Day at Laguerres, and Other Days" (Houghton), which is mechanically a model of bookmaking, from the fine laid paper with a soft, dull surface for the tired eye, to the clear, black-faced, honest type. The running head-line has been abolished and a neat marginal title substituted; and the page-number is put at the bottom, near the inner margin.

The sketches are worth such a tasteful setting, for they are bits of color, and of eccentric and pleasing character-drawing, gathered in many lands during delightful holidays. The scene changes in turn from New York, to Venice, Constantinople, Cordova, Bulgaria and Virginia-and in every place the author is at home by reason of his good-fellowship. He always likes a fellow with a heart, whether it is a little bit rascally or the well-regulated possession of a judge. Perhaps he discovers the heart sooner in an unconventional man with a taste for idleness; perhaps most of us do. That is why so many well-bred people get through life with a dull ache for sympathy concealed about them; and the best proof that this is true is their liking for Mr. Smith and Mr. Page, and Col. Carter and Marse Chan.

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THE best fiction and the culture of the decade have been so depressing in their tendency that honest, intellectual folks have been hungering for a relief. The subtilty with which modern heroes and heroines have been endowed has made average men and women suspicious of their best friends. You will see a frank, manly boy grow reserved, cautious, suspicious, after a course of analytical fiction. He begins to catalogue his own father and mother, and hold them up to imaginary standards. Then it reacts upon himself. One day it dawns on him to judge his own actions with the same severity that he judges other people. He begins to be ironical toward himself; then he distrusts his own best actions; then he loses his self-respect and ambition, and there is nothing left for him but intellectual torture. He is not alone in his Fool's Purgatory; he is a type-so much a type that we call it "the unrest of the age," and imagine that that settles it.

The finest intellectual expression of it is not malicious or selfish; it means to be rigidly honest. A delicate, sensitive nature will go at the work with the heroism of one who would sacrifice everything for truth. When a man is mentioned he will tell you briefly what he is, and then at length what he is not. This he calls giving you his "limitations." Now the things which even the ablest, justest man is not are a multitude to those which he is. He could not have the qualities which distinguish him and be at the same time a hundred different

men.

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The modern critical attitude expects every man to be a microcosm -and of course it is always disappointed.

But Mr. Smith comes along with his Colonel Carter and says: "See here what a little bit of good-fellowship does in a hard-working world; how it smooths the corners and brightens very humble quarters. It won't do everything (as Dickens thought it would), but it helps a deal. And you can find it in almost any man if you let your own light shine."

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The Lesson of the Master and Other Stories. By Henry James. New York and London: Macmillan and Company.

Jules Bastien-LePage and His Art. A Memoir by André Theuriet. A Study of Marie Bashkirtseff, by Mathilde Blande. New York: Macmillan and Company.

It Happened Yesterday. By Frederick Marshall. New York: D. Appleton and Company.

The Art of Acting. By Percy Fitzgerald, M. A., F. S. A. New York: Macmillan and Company.

Adventures of an Evangelist. By Nelson Ayers. Chicago: Laird and

Lee.

Clytie and Other Poems. By Marguerite E. Easter. Boston: A. J. Philpott and Company.

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"FAREWELL, EM'LY, FAREWELL! YOUR FATHER HAS TOOK ME

BY THE EAR AND KICKED ME TO THAT EXTENT THAT MY MANLY HEART IS A BUSTIN' WITH SHAME AND SORRER. NOTHIN' IS LEFT FOR ME NOW BUT TO HUNT INJUNS FOR THE REMAINDER OF MY 'RETCHED LIFE. ME AN' MY PAL LEAVES FOR THE WILD WEST THIS MINNIT; THIS LETTER CONTAINS MY WILL WHAT'LL MAKE YOU MY HAIRESS, ALSO A NICKEL TO BUY A MEMENTO OF ONE WHO WILL BE HEARD OF IN BORDER ANNALS AS CURDLE LUNG, THE DUST TOSSER. FAREWELL, GOOD-BYE, ADOO! [Exits hastily with pal.]

FAR

THE ENCHANTED PORTRAIT.

AR away in the State of Maine there stands a fine old colonial mansion. It is out of repair now but you can easily see what a pleasant home it must have been for Hester, the little girl who formerly dwelt there. When her parents died the old house and all it contained were sold to strangers. Everything went to pay her father's debts, but of all the heirlooms the one she most regretted to part with was the full-length portrait of an ancestor in Continental uniform. Hester always regarded the old General with the deepest affection, and it seemed to her that he never failea to return her glances with a jovial smile. His face was round and rosy, and it was evident from his mellow eye and cheerful nose that he and port had been the fastest friends. He must have been an important personage if one could judge by his blue and buff coat with gold facings. One hand was on the hilt of his sword, the other held a folded paper and Hester used to wonder what was written on it. But the rosy General was sold with everything else.

The distant relatives with whom Hester went to live as governess resided in the golden city of Manhattan. They

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