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"ROCK OF AGES cleft for me!" The words swept along on the air as though borne on wings. "Let me--" A rushing of real wings from amongst the reeds along the river side drowned for a moment the melody. Again it came to us with fuller force: "Let me hide myself in-in Thee!" "In Thee!" There seemed in those pleading words a deeper pathos than when I had heard them closed about by conventional walls. Here we were under the broad archway of the heavens, the grass stretching out around us for miles, like an ocean of emerald tints, and to our ears came the "winged words" of prayer.

My companion turned towards me. "That's powerful sweet!" he said.

'Yes, it finds response in all hearts," I replied.

Yes, I say, too, it kinder lifts me up." "I like it for its simplicity, and that it is a Christian prayer not bound by human creeds."

"Well, you say all that different to me, but, I tell you, I feel it all the same."

The man who rode beside me was about twenty-five years of age. His face was browned by the winds of the plains. His eyes were very bright. The large white hat was pushed up from his forehead, the breadth of which was one single span of beauty. I admired the roundness of his form and the breadth of his shoulders, clothed about as they were by that peculiar style of dress adopted by the handsome young cowboy of the period. I say handsome and young, because the natural love of color, and a certain artistic arrangement and attention to detail, seem to belong to those young fellows, from whom I have received so many courtesies-so much, in fact, that gives pleasurable zest to remembrance. I liked to look on my companion seated in his Mexican saddle, yet I liked best the ringing laugh that came sometimes from his handsome mouth, or better, perhaps, was the curving of his lips to a half smile, showing, as he did so, the glitter of well-shaped, white teeth.

We were silent awhile after the hymn ceased coming to us; then I asked:

VOL. VIII-35

"Where did that hymn come from?" "Not from no spirit, you bet! It come from Rob Ridwell. He'd sing the shoes off 'n Pat-i. You've heard that I-talian woman, I suppose? Yes? Well, Rob and me heard her oncet in San Francisco. We were there along in the winter time, a year or so ago, when she was there. She sung everything around pretty nigh to pieces; but, I tell you, Rob just got even with her when we come away. He's made a good bit by it, too.” "How has he benefited by it?" I asked, in surprise.

I

"Oh! he's made himself a name. think that's the way the tender-foot language would give it;" and with that the merrylaugh rang out clearly on the breeze.

He's sung me to sleep many a time." 'There it is again," I said, as another air came floating along with such indescribable sweetness as can only be felt in a lonely, wild place.

"This 'll be one of his sweep-stake nights."

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"Where?" I asked.

"Down there at Bluff Point. We'll be there directly;" and as he spoke, a collection of shocks, in the midst of which extended a long log cabin, came to view. Many men moved here and there before us as we entered the narrow opening, which, like a street, ran lengthwise of the smaller huts arrayed on either side. The longer cabin, formed of logs in their rough state, stood back of these, and this was surrounded by smaller cabins or shocks ranged at the back.

"This gentleman is a stranger," said my companion to an elderly man who approached. "Let me make you acquainted with Captain Tinner, but I be blest if I know your name. West, did you say? All right. Captain West, Captain Tinner."

"I am pleased to meet you, Captain West."

"I'm not a captain," I replied.

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waists, each having for adornment whatever suited best the particular taste of the wearer.

boots, broad belts bound about their My neighbor remarked: "Jimmy was an out an' out tender-foot till he got broke in. He kicked a good bit, but we drawed him in, and now he's as good as you'll find."

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“There's some things he aint come to yet," remarked Captain Tinner; "he aint stuck on your cookin'."

"No!" shouted my happy-hearted companion. "He's too partickeler. He wants the dishes washed twicet-a-day.”

Jimmy quietly remarked to me, afterwards, in his grave manner, that when his friend cooked he always turned his back towards him and looked out of the window.

"Boys," continued Captain Tinner, "this here gentleman is a stranger, and you jest do his wishin' for 'im. I don't want no hack work. I trust 'im to you." "Ef you'd like to wash," said a delicate looking boy, "come this way." I entered the shock near by, and was left alone. The room contained a cot bed which was clean; a tin basin upon a box in the corner, a bucket of water and a dipper. The hard earth floor had no covering, but the small window was tastefully draped with newspapers in imitation When we had finished our supper and of a lambrequin. After refreshing myself discussed awhile the best traits of the with a wash, and a rub of the dark crash cowboy and his steed, we crossed the towel, I stepped out and joined "the plain about one hundred rods from that boys" once again. This was my first trip point to a tent which was surmounted by to the prairie-lands, and I enjoyed the a flag. The seats, which were arranged "newness" of old Nature as only a town- for about fifty people, were of boards bred man may. "Take a seat, stranger, which were supported by rough stones, said a young man rising from a log near or else they were formed of logs covered by. I seated myself beside him. He with the natural bark. The stage conwas small of stature, though well built. sisted of a broad wagon, turned bottom His features were regular and handsome. upwards. The seats were soon filled by Dark eyes, dark hair and a dark complex- the people living within a range of ten ion gave him a noticeably foreign look. miles around the camp, the boys sitting "Are you an American?" I asked. "Oh, along on the ground, there being a naryes," he replied gravely, for he never row aisle on either side the tent. beat the ambient airs with his laughter as did most of his companions. "Yes, I am an American. My father was an officer of the United States Navy. He's dead now. I've got Spanish blood. My grand-mother was a Spanish lady. I came out here just to try it, as so many do. We read of cowboy life and came out to try it. My people in the East are always writing to me to come back. Some day I will go."

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When the singer made his appearance through a small opening near the stage, the uproar in the way of applause was deafening. "Hurrah for Ridwell!" 'Rob's the man to sing Pat-i hollow!" "Three cheers for our pry-medoner!" and other appeals to the vanity of their hero rent the air. He stood smiling and nodding in a cheerful way, until silence prevailed. Stepping to the centre of the stage he began in a minor key the national hymn of Italy. Gradually his voice, as though responsive to the promptings of his spirit, rose, bearing the melody upwards with that spiritualistic fervor which takes its tone from the motherhood of Genius. The wild life of the prairie seemed for the time closed about by the atmosphere of some hallowed region, so rapt seemed the singer in the power of song, so silently uplifted were the hearts of his listeners. The faces of the audience were indicative of the passions aroused or soothed, according to the nature that received the

impression; yet to all, the melody had brought something tender, something good: Peace, Regret, or Tears. He ceased. The silence was for one moment unbroken; then, as though by one impulse, the little crowd arose to its feet shouting its fullest approbation. The delicate boy who had invited me to "wash" on my arrival, stepped forth with a large bunch of wild flowers, interspersed with the shining leaves of water plants and the crisp curled buffalo grass. He placed it before the feet of the singer with that half timid, reverential air that a boy shows when making an offering to the hero of his choice. Dropping upon one knee, Rob Ridwell took up the bouquet with a smile and pleasant bow, and with such grace of action and manner as would have done justice to a "child of song" trained in the way of worldly training.

Song followed song-some of them being those best known to the audience, others of a more cultivated style, which had struck his fancy whilst attending the operatic or theatrical performances in San Francisco, Denver, or Cheyenne. They were all "shows," it mattered not

who stood as a star before the footlights. The whirligig on the stage, deluding with its tinsel and gauze, is a "show;" the minstrel troupe, be they ringers or singers, are combined into a "show;" and the opera, with its volume of song outpoured for the world before it, that listens and waits to applaud and caress with its praise (if the singers be successful), is to the cowboy only a 'show." Rob Ridwell sang as I have heard few untutored men sing, and the glory of that melody comes to me often amid the changeful scenes of my life.

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Though of a much more material character in its way, the presentations made after the concluding song, showed me the generosity of the honest fellows amongst whom I had fallen by chance. Purses holding from $2 to $10 were emptied into a gay silk kerchief, which my riding companion took from his neck. Ungrudgingly given and uncounted, the 'pile" was handed to Rob with the simple injunction of: "Here, ole fellow, take what you have earned;" and he, with a pleasant laugh, merely took it, and that was all.

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Hamish West.

THE LEGEND OF DEAD MAN'S LAKE.*

VER a gray haze waketh the morn,
In a region that all forsake,

And the noons they follow the desolate noons,
On the shores of the Dead Man's Lake.

'Tis a world of forest all withered and bleak,
Where never a leaf doth grow;

But a gray mist broods over water and woods,
Twixt heaven and earth below;

And never a sound in all the world round,

But the desolate call of a crow.

* Dead Man's Lake, a lonely sheet of water that lies in a desolate region of the Indian Peninsula, between Lake Huron and Georgian Bay. It is situated in a forest of dead pines and hemlocks, blighted by bush fires long before the memory of any living man, and this adds materially to the desolation of an already dreary region of swamp and rock. The Indians have a legend that a chief was treacherously murdered on this lake, and that his body still lies with upturned face at the bottom. Hence its name and the dread curse they believe hangs over the vicinity, which they always shun.

And there in a mist, by clammy winds kissed,
Where never a creature is seen,

All fringed in with weeds and dank marsh reeds
The lake it lieth between.

The golden summers they go and they come;
The seasons they wake and they sleep;
The partridge drum, and the wild bees' hum,
Are heard over meadow and deep;

But never the golden summers that come,
Or the seasons that sleep and wake,

Can waken the rest that broods on the breast
Of the desolate Dead Man's Lake.

There is never a ray of the sun by day,

But ever that horrible haze,

That hangs like a shroud or the ghost of a cloud
All about the dread hush of its days:

And ever the moon at her midnight noon,
Half a cloak doth her cloud-veil make,
As she peers with a pallid and startled look
In the bosom of Dead Man's Lake.

And ever, 'tis said, that she seeth a dread
White face of a long-dead man,

That floateth down there, with the weeds in its hair,
And a look so fixed and wan;

Like the ghost of a hate, that lieth in wait,
Through the years that it longeth to span.

And ever at midnight, white and drear,
When the dim moon sheddeth her light,
Will the startled deer, as they speed by here,
Slacken their phantom-like flight;

And into the shade that the forest hath made,

A wider circle they take;

For they dread lest their tread wake the sleep of the dead
In the bosom of Dead Man's Lake.

And as long as it lies with that prayer in its eyes,

And that curse on its white sealed lips,

Will the lake lie wan, and the years drift on,

In their horrible, hushed eclipse,

Will the lake lie under the strange mute wonder
Of the moon as she pallidly dips;

Will the song of bird there never be heard,
Nor the music of wind-swept tree,

But only the dread of the skies overhead,
That the mists will never set free,

From the terrible spell that there ever will dwell
As long as the ages be.

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And there it lies and holdeth the skies,

In a trance they never can break,

While the years, they follow the desolate years,
On the shores of the Dead Man's Lake.

William Wilfred Campbell.

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BY GUY B. SEELY.

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HILE other Italian cities may surpass Naples in the wealth of their historic monuments, or their treasures of art, she has a peculiar attraction for the traveler in being the centre of a district combining a splendor of natural scenery with points of profound antiquarian and geologic interest. In every direction the tourist finds an embarrassment of riches. To the east and south is a region, in plain view from the town and quickly and easily reached, which the archaeologist, the geologist and the lover of nature have found of inexhaustible interest; but immediately to the west, as though to force upon the attention the more renowned eastern outlook, the high promontory of Posilippo limits the view. Running south from the city's southern water-front, it forms a fine background for the brilliant tones of the buildings that cover the plateau at its foot. Here, embowered in dark-green foliage, are many villas and buildings of historic note, dotting the eastern face of the hill and commanding as from a grand stand the panorama of the bay with its glories of color and mountain form. It is from this hill that the more famous views of the city and bay have been taken; and here,

one warm summer morning, after sauntering through the pretty park of the "Villa Nazionale" at the city's western end, and along the gentle ascent of the coast road, I accepted the pressing invitation of a cabman who had patiently followed me, and chartered him and his trap for the day, for a sum which, to one of his calling in America, or to the fellow himself, should he ever emigrate, would seem none too generous a pourboire. The guide-books admonish strangers in Italy to limit fees and payments to the sums established by law, or by custom, but to one from northern nations these often seem pitiably small. The natives, however, do not always take this view, as in the case of one who accompanied me across the city and engaged a carriage for the two-mile trip and back for the sum of fifty centesimi, or ten cents. The regular fare would have been but four cents more. It does one good to read in the papers, as I did lately, that the Naples hackmen had struck for higher pay.

The Posilippo road is bordered with the villas of the Neapolitans, and one may well be perplexed in the choice of location, whether to the left by the shores of that wonderfully translucent sea whose waves, of a luminous emerald hue in the shallows, bathe the very foundations of a villa and the walls of a garden

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