‘U—­m!’ growled the lawyer; ’one kind of dash he certainly has—­to
    perfection.’

    ‘And what is that?’

    ‘Balder-dash!’ was the annihilating reply.

    I report this for the special consideration of Governor Andrew.

    Nor less illustrative of the terrible tendencies of civil war, is
    the following: 

    ‘We have a whole navy of gun-boats at Island Number Ten,’ said the
    Colonel, reflectively.

    ‘Yes,’ was the unwary reply.

    ’Then how comes it that if the knave can take the Ten, a navy
    can’t?’

    Yours in grief,

    CONSTANT READER.

* * * * *

The Legislature of Kentucky has, probably, by this time, made it a criminal offence for any person to join the K.G.C.  As soon as the lists shall have been published of all those Northern men who have belonged to the order, the traitors will find themselves in quite as enviable a situation as though ‘escaped convict’ were branded on their foreheads.

* * * * * From one now far away in the South—­albeit not on the Southern side—­we have an ornithological reminiscence which may be of interest to those who endeavor to solve the problem, whether animals ever rise to reasoning.

I have amused myself the past year raising a brood of chickens in my little backyard.  Being ‘tenderly brought up,’ they are, of course, very tame, particularly a little brown pullet, that lays an egg in the cellar every morning.  A few days ago, as I was leaving the house after breakfast, my wife cried out for me to come into the kitchen.  I did so, and found the little brown hen standing quietly by the door at the head of the cellar-stairs, evidently waiting for it to be opened.  Going outside, I found the servant had neglected to open the ‘bulkhead’ door, as usual, and my wise little biddy had concluded to go down-cellar through the kitchen.  When I drove her out and opened the outer-door, she went down and laid, as usual.  She was never in the house before, to my knowledge, and has not been since.  This is a fact, and is only one more instance added to many I could adduce, which go to show that the ‘dumb creatures’ think and reason.

* * * * *

Poetry on bells is divisible into two kinds, the tintinnabulistic, which refers to little hand-tinklers, sleigh-bells, and the kind which oriental mothers were wont, of old, to sew to the hems of their daughters’ garments, [that they might tell by the sound whether the young ladies were at mischief or no,] and the campanologistic, descriptive solely of large church ringers, Big Toms of Oxford, and the regular vivos voco, fulgura frango giants, such as Mr. Meneely makes and sends all over the country, to factories, churches, depots, and steamboats.  The sleigh-bell song, according to this classification, is tintinnabulistic; so, too, is the Russian troika,