JOHN NAGLE'S PHILOSOPHY.

Complied by SYDNEY T. PRATT, Manitowoc, Wisconsin. Entered according to the act of Congress, in the year 1901, in the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, by Sydney T. Pratt.

AUTUMN

There is something in the approach of autumn, the border land of summer, that is depressing, just as if the shadow of death were brooding over the future. There are dark clouds in the sky which cut off the sunshine; there is a gloom in the heart which darkens hope and makes life "scarcely worth living." The wind has a mournful cadence, and the trees saw as if the motion were a sigh of sorrow. Everything seems to harmonize with the prevailing spirit of sadness, and animate nature moans forth a dirge. Dew drops seem like tears, and the evening breeze is a sigh. The moon itself seems to wear a garb of grief and floats among the clouds, a tear-stained Diana. It is a season for men to grow mad, for anguish to gnaw at the heart, and for melancholy to usurp the throne of reason. The retina only receives dark impressions, the tympanum transmits none but doleful sounds. One is feasted on dismal thoughts on every hand until it becomes a regular symposium of sorrow. Those imps, the Blues, that feed one on dejection, are in their heyday, implacable as a Nemesis, persistent as a Devil. They revel in gloom and drag one down to the Slough of Despond. Work is performed mechanically, and what in its nature is amusement, is now a bore. One "sucks melancholy from a song as a weasel sucks eggs," and longs for night that he may seek forgetfulness in sleep--the twin-sister of Death. A miserable world this, when the year is falling "into the sear and yellow leaf;" and there is a lingering wish that the shadows which come from the West would bring that icy breath that gives forgetfulness and rest.

POEMS.

By WILFRID EARL CHASE, Madison. Copyright, 1913, by the Author.

FAITH

Maze of antinomies and miracles!

Bewildered, purblind we are led along This rock-strewn, flower-decked, mystic, wondrous way.

Whence came? What are we? Whither are we led?

Wherefore journey we? Why such fickle path?

And Nature's myriad answers, voiced in the storm's Wild tumult, fringed on the gentian's azure cup, Or limned on human brow, we would descry,-- And some we darkly guess, and some we almost know.

BOOK OF THE GREEN LAKE MANSE.

A SEQUEL TO THE RHYMED STORY OF WISCONSIN. By J. N. DAVIDSON.

MY NEIGHBOR'S CHICKENS

(The following verses express no grievance of my own. I could not ask for more considerate neighbors. But all gardeners are not so fortunate, and it is for their sake and at the suggestions of one of them that these lines were written.)

Sometimes I say "The Dickens!

There are my neighbor's chickens!"

My neighbor I like well But--let me grievance tell-- I do not like his chickens;-- Save when he bids me to a roast And plays the part of kindly host.

My garden is most dear to me From carrot bed to apple tree, And so my patience sickens When I behold the chickens In it and scratching merrily.

Dark gloom grows darker, thickens, In looking at those chickens.

A certain scientific man Once called the hen "A feeble bird."

It is, I'm sure, on no such plan My neighbor's hens are built; the word "Feeble" to them does not apply.

I wish Professor would stand by And see those hens make mulching fly.

Or let him watch them as they eat My cauliflower choice and sweet, Or gorge themselves on berries fine; The way they always do with mine.

They run on their destructive feet From stalk to stalk, from vine to vine, Or scratch as if they dug a mine.

And so, my neighbor, won't you please, My cares dispel, my troubles ease, By keeping all your hens at home?

Soon, soon the very earth will freeze And then the fowls at large may roam.

So I'll not need the pen of Dickens To tell my horror of your chickens!

TO MY NEIGHBORS AT HILL CREST

Shall I do dear Sam a wrong If I write no little song Telling how he pleases Grace, Brings the light to Tompie's face, Shares their play or runs a race, Merry all about the place?

No: I'd do the duck no wrong If I failed to make the song.

He'll not care for verse or rhyme.

But this pleasant summer-time I have seen my little neighbors, Happy in their kindly labors Making Sam and others glad, So I say, "God bless the lad; Bless the lassie"; and I know That the love to Sam they show Makes their own hearts richer, truer; Makes the sky seem brighter, bluer; Makes them to us all a joy (I mean duck, and girl, and boy).

So I'd surely do a wrong If I did not say in song To loved Tompie and Miss Grace (Merry all about the place) That their duck's important, quite, With his new-grown feathers white; But the more important thing Is their love; of this I sing!

IN THE LIMESTONE VALLEY.

PEN PICTURES OF EARLY DAYS IN WESTERN WISCONSIN. By S. W.

BROWN. Copyright, 1900, La Crosse, Wisconsin.

FROM CHAPTER II, pp. 37-38.

Such was Neoshone, as the Indians who frequently camped there called it when the first white man stood on the bank of the river and watched the rushing waters flow swiftly by. They had borne the red man in his canoe, and around this very spot the Winnebago hunter had secured fine strings of ducks, and for generations had trapped for mink and gathered in abundance the fish that swarmed in every eddy and pool.

The hill at the north was crowned with a beautiful grove of young oak trees, and, standing on its slope, the early pioneer beheld before his eyes a magnificent panorama. In the distance the everlasting hills seemed to stand guard round and about it as did the walls of the Jewish capitol encircle its sacred precincts.

Valley, hillside, prairie, and plain, stretched away from the spectator's feet in varying lines and curves, while down the center rolled the grand old river. It seemed like a second Canaan, waiting for the coming of the chosen people, its soil ready to be waked by the share of the settler's plow, when crops would come forth as if touched by the magician's wand.

From

"ON GROWING OLD."

By NEAL BROWN.

Read before the Phantom Club, Oconomowoc, Wisconsin, April 15, 1913.

... Growing old has many stages. You can remember the time when, in reading your favorite author, you were disgusted to find that he had made his hero forty years old, and you wondered how he could be guilty of imputing romance to such an unconscionable age. By and by, even though you found forty years to be the old age of youth, you were solaced by the thought that it was the youth of old age, and still later you will wonder where youth ends and old age begins.

In many assemblages you once found yourself the youngest man, or among the youngest. But with swift-flying years, you finally found yourself equal in age to most of those in all assemblies; but the time comes when only younger men are crowding around you. And when you try to evade the thought that you are growing old, along comes some kindly friend with the greeting, "How young you are looking."

You grow to regard as babes, wild, young blades of forty or fifty. You may comfort yourself with the thought expressed by Holmes. He says that he could feel fairly immune from death as long as older men whom he knew, still remained, especially if they were of a much greater age than himself. They were farther out on the skirmish line, and must be taken first.

MY ALLEGIANCE.

By CORA KELLEY WHEELER, Marshfield, Wisconsin. Copyright, 1896, The Editor Publishing Company.

FROM "MY LADY ELEANOR," pp. 119-20.

I was wounded at Acre. My strong right arm will never strike another blow for the glory of the Cross. I started sadly out, in spite of our victory, for my western home.

I thought to look in Eleanor's face once more, and see if the years had brought any tender thoughts of me into her heart. If not, I should never trouble her with any claim of mine. I knew she passed her time in works of charity, and that the house of Savoy had never held the love and reverence of the people before as it held it today, under the rule of my Lady Eleanor.

We reached Savoy. In the old days I carried to the lady of my heart a reprieve from death; but to me she brought now a reprieve that took all the grief and sorrow out of my life, as she laid her sweet face on my breast and whispered, "I have loved you ever since the night you brought me home; why did you ever leave me?" With the love of the Duchess of Savoy began a new life; but to me she will ever be, as when I loved her first, "My Lady Eleanor."