A better day had truly dawned upon this ruined and deeply afflicted family.  Mrs. Harwood and her brother continued to be their steady friends.  For a year Alfred remained in his new situation as an efficient clerk, and at the end of that time had his salary advanced.  During that period, Mary, and Anna, whose health had become measurably restored, employed all their spare time in embroidery, which, at the excellent prices which, through the aid of Mrs. Harwood, they were enabled to get for their really beautiful work, brought in a handsome addition to their brother’s earnings, and this enabled them to live in independence, comfort and respectability.  As for Ellen, her husband had become truly a reformed man, and provided for her comfortably.

It is now nearly two years since this happy change took place, and there is every appearance that another and a still happier one is about to occur in reference to Anna.  Charles Williams is seen very often, of late, riding out with her and attending her to public places.  The reader can easily guess the probable result.  If there; is not a wedding-party soon, then appearances, in this case at least, are very deceptive.

THE RUM-SELLER’S DREAM.

“HOW much have you taken in to-day, Sandy?” asked a modern rum-seller of his bar-tender, after the doors and windows of his attractive establishment were closed for the night.

“Only about a dollar, Mr. Graves.  I never saw such dull times in my life.”

“Only about a dollar!  Too bad! too bad!  I shall be ruined at this rate.”

“I really don’t know what ails the people now.  But ’spose it’s these blamenation temperance folks that’s doin’ all the mischief.”

“We must get up something new, Sandy;—­something to draw attention to our house.”

“So I’ve been a thinkin’.  Can’t we get George Washington Dixon to walk a plank for us?  That would draw crowds, you know; and then every feller almost that we got in here would take a drink.”

“We can’t get him, Sandy.  He’s secured over at the—.  But, any how, the people are getting up to that kind of humbuggery; and I’m afraid, that, like the Indian’s gun, it would cost in the end more than it came to.”

“Couldn’t we get a maremaid?”

“A mermaid?”

“Yes, a maremaid.  You know they had one in town t’other day.  It would be a prime move, if we could only do it.  We might fix her up here, just back of where I stand, so that every feller who called to see it would have to come up to the bar, front-face.  There’d be no backing out then, you know, without ponying up for a drink.  No one would be mean enough, after seeing a real maremaid for nothing, to go away without shelling out a fip for a glass of liquor.”

“Nonsense, Sandy!  Where are we to get a mermaid?”

“Where did they get that one from?”

“That was brought from Japan; and was a monkey’s head and body sewed on to a fish’s tail,—­so they say;”