Yours truly, CORA.

Oswego, N.Y.

DEAR JACK:  I send you a riddle which I found.  I take ST. NICHOLAS
and like it very much.  I have all of the volumes from 1874.

I am a word of plural number,
A foe to peace and human slumber,
Yet, do but add the letter S,—­
Lo! what a metamorphosis! 
What plural was, is plural now no more,
And sweet’s what bitter was before.

    Yours truly, KITTIE.

Talking about riddles, reminds me of one that was made by Richard Whately, an archbishop of Dublin, as I’ve heard.  This is it: 

     “When from the Ark’s capacious round
        The beasts came forth in pairs,
      Who was the first to hear the sound
        Of boots upon the stairs?”

I’m told that it never has been guessed right by anybody; yet the archbishop said there was an answer, although he did not say what it was.  May be you can solve the riddle, my dears, if you brush up your wits a bit?  Let me know as soon as you think you have the right answer.

THE NEWEST FASHION.

The girls of the Red School-house often talk about new fashions, especially when the Little Schoolma’am is about, for she is pretty sure to drop some useful hints.  Well, one day she told them, among other things, about the “latest novelty” in ladies’ ball-dresses at Upernavik, in Greenland.

As nearly as I can remember, she said that the costume consists of a little jacket, made of bright-colored calico or flannel; long pantaloons of sealskin, trimmed like the jacket and sitting close to the figure; and white, red or blue boots:  the whole set off by gay ribbons and all the beads the wearer can get.

A jaunty suit enough, no doubt; but, if she wore only that, the wearer must have been obliged to dance, merely to keep herself warm.

By the way, I wonder what ever possessed them to call that frozen country Green-land?

TO SURPRISE A DOG.

This is the way a man among the Himalaya Mountains once astonished a stranger dog.  He put on a pair of huge goggles and walked steadily and quietly toward the dog, without speaking a word.  The dog bristled up and stared hard for a moment, and then, all at once, he seemed to wilt, and away he slunk as if ashamed of himself.

I heard about this only the other day, my dears, and I tell it to you merely to warn you not to try the little trick, unless you are sure your dog will not get angry and jump for you.

It would not look well for you to slink off as if you were ashamed of yourself.

THE KINDERGARTEN AT HOME.