A CHEERFUL CHURCH.

REV. DR. TALMAGE INTERPRETS A PASSAGE FROM SOLOMON'S SONG.

The World's Greatest Preacher Explains the Kind of Church He Has Tried to Make of the Tabernacle--A Few Earnest Words of Farewell--A Sweet Name.

BROOKLYN, May 13.--The Tabernacle was crowded to the doors today when Rev. Dr. Talmage took for the subject of his forenoon sermon a passage of Scripture which has been made the subject of much discussion and various in-

terpretation by modern theologians. His theme was, "A Cheerful Church," and the text was selected from Solomon's Song iv, 1, "Behold, thou art fair, my love."

"Higher criticism" says that this book of Solomon's Song is a love scene, a forlorn maiden singing for her beau. If so, it is an unclean and debauched ut-

terance inserted in the pure word of God and is not fit for common reading. My opinion is that it is an inspired ode setting forth the feeling of Christ toward the church and of the church toward Christ. Christ is the bridegroom, and the church is the bride. The same words we can utter today truthfully, whether in regard to the church of God in general or this church in particular, "Behold, thou art fair, my love."

The past week has been one of pro-

longed congratulation for that we have for 25 years been permitted to associate with each other in the relation of pastor and people. When I came to Brooklyn, I found a small band of Christian disci-

ples who from various causes had be-

come less and less until they stood upon the very verge of extinction as a church, and the question was being agitated from time to time whether it would be possi-

ble to maintain a church life longer. In-

deed, had not those men and women been consecrated and earnest, they would have surrendered to the adverse circumstances. They marshaled a congrega-

tional meeting, and gathering up all the forces possible they cast 19 votes for a pastor, all of which I am happy to have received.

It was not through any spirit of personal courage or reckless adventure that I was led from one of the warmest and most congenial pastorates in Philadelphia that a man ever enjoyed to this then most uninviting field, but it was the feeling that God had called me to the work, and I was sure he would see me through. I have thought that it might be profitable to us to state briefly what kind of a church we have been trying to establish.

The Tabernacle Church. In the first place ,I remark that we have been trying to build here a Christian church--distinctively such; in other words, a church where we should preach the Lord Jesus Christ and him crucified. My theology is all gone into five letters--Jesus. Jesus, the pardon of all offenses. Jesus, the foundation for all structures. Jesus, the balm for all wounds. Jesus, the eye salve for all blindness. Jesus, the guide through all perplexities. Jesus, the hope for all discouragements. Jesus, the reform for all wrongs. I have faith to believe that there is more power in one drop of the blood of Jesus Christ to cure the woes of the world than in an ocean full of human quackery. Jesus is the grandest note in any minstrelsy. He is the brightest gem in any crown; height overtopping all height; the center of every circumference; the circumference to every center; the pacifier of all turbulence; the umpire of all disputes. Jesus, Jesus! At his table all nations are to sit. Around his throne all worlds are to revolve. He is to be the irradiation of the universe. Jesus, Jesus! It is that truth that we have tried to preach in this Tabernacle. Do you ask more minutely what we believe? I can tell you. We have no dry, withered, juiceless theology. We believe in God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, the deliverer of the distressed, the home for the homeless, the friend for the friendless. We believe in Jesus Christ, able to save to the uttermost, pardoning the guilty, imputing his righteousness to the believer. We believe in the Holy Ghost, the comforter, the sanctifier, cheering up the heart in life's ills and kindling bright lights in every dark landing place. We believe that the whole race is so sunken in sin that nothing but the omnipotent arm of God can ever lift it out. We believe in grace--free grace, sovereign grace, triumphant grace, eternal grace. We believe in a Bible--authentic in its statements, immaculate in its teachings, glorious in its promises.

We believe in heaven, the abode of the righteous, and in hell, the residence of those who are soul suicides--of their own free choice refusing the divine mercy. We believe in the salvation of all men who accept Christ by faith, be they sprinkled or immersed, worship they in cathedral or in log cabin, believe they in Presbyterianism or Episcopacy, dwell they under Italian skies or in Siberian snowstorms, be they Ethiopian or American. All one in Christ. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, on the way to heaven.

We built this Tabernacle for the purpose of setting forth these great theories of the gospel of the Son of God. Would that we had been more faithful in the pulpit! Would that we had been more faithful in the pew!

An Unconventional Church. I remark, further, that we have tried here to build a church distinctively unconventional. Instead of asking, as some people are disposed to do, how other people do it, we have asked the question how people do not do it. Imperious cus-

tom has decided that churches shall be singular, cheerless, gloomy, unsympathetic, forgetting that what mean call a pious gloom is impious, and that that church has the best architecture where the people are the most comfortable, and that that is the most efficient Christian service where the people are made most sick of sin and most anxious after Christ and heaven. And so we called the architects together for our first church building and said, "Give us an amphithea-

ter"--that is, a large family circle, gath-

ered around a fireplace.

For many years we had felt that an amphitheater was the only proper shape for an audience room. The prominent architects of the country said: "It can-

not be done. You need a churchly building." And so we had plan after plan of churchly buildings presented, but in due time God sent a man who grasped our idea and executed it. So far from being a failure, it satisfied our want, and all our three churches were built on the amphitheatrical plan, and scores of churches all over the country have adopted the same plan.

And, my brethren and sisters, we fail in our work just in proportion as we try to be like other churches. We believe that God intended every church, like ev-

ery man, to be individual, gathering up all its peculiarities and idiosyncrasies and hurling them all toward some good and grand object. In other words, no two churches ought ever to be just alike.

Here is a church, for instance, whose ob-

ject it is to prepare philosophers and art-

ists and critics for heaven. God speed them in the difficult work! Here is a church, on the other hand, that proposes to bring only the poor into the kingdom of Jesus Christ, looking not after the rich. God speed such a church in its undertaking! But there is a larger idea that a church may take--bringing in the rich and the poor, the wise and the igno-

rant, the high and the low, so that kneel-

ing beside each other shall be the man faring sumptuously every day and the man who could not get his breakfast. God speed such a church!

Oh, my friends, we need to break away from slavery to ecclesiastical custom.

We dare not sing if anybody hears us. We dare not preach unless we have rounded off our sentences to suit the criticism of the world. We dare not dress for church until we have examined the fashion plates and would rather stay at home than appear with a coat or a hat not sanctioned by custom. When will the day of deliverance come to the church of God, when, instead of a dead religion laid out in state on a catafalque of pomp and insincerity, we shall have a living, bounding, sympathetic, glowing Chris-

tianity?

A Happy Church.

I remark, further, that we have tried here to build and to conduct a cheerful church. While, as you know, we have not held back the terrors of the law and the sterner doctrines of the gospel, we have tried in this house to present to this people the idea that the gladdest, bright-

est, happiest thing in all the universe is the Christian religion. There is so much trouble in the world. Business men have so many anxieties. Toiling men have so many fatigues. Orphans have so many desolations. For God's sake, if there be any bright place on earth, show it to them! Let the church of Jesus Christ be the most cheerful spot on earth.

Let me say that I do not want anybody to come whining around me about the Christian religion. I have no faith in a religion made up of equal parts of wormwood, vinegar and red pepper. If the religion presented to us be a depression, we will get along better without it.

If it be a joy, let it shine out from your face and from your conversation. If a man comes to my house to talk of re-

ligion with lugubrious countenance and manner full of sniffle and dolorousness, I feel like saying to my wife, "You had better lock up the silver before he steals something." I have found it an invariable rule that men who profess faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, priding them-

selves at the same time on their sanctimoniousness, always turn out badly--I never knew an exception--while those who are the most consistent, the most useful and the most consecrated have perfume in their conversation and heaven in their face.

The happiest Christians that I have ever known have been persons from 60 to 80 years of age. By that time people get over the shams and the pretenses of society and have no longer any patience with anything like imposture in religion.

O Christian, how dare you be gloomy? Is not God your father? Is not Jesus Christ your Saviour? Has not your path all through life been strewn with mer-

cies? Are you insensible to the fact that there are glories awaiting you in the bet-

ter land, doxologies of celestial worship, eternal chorals, tearless eyes, songs that resound under arches of strength and hosannas that clap their hands at the foot of the throne?

Is it nothing to you that all the hills of heaven are radiant with the faces of those who have gone up from you and who are waiting for your coming, ready to keep with you eternal holiday? Is there nothing in songs that never cease, in hearts that never ache, in splendors that never die, to make you glad? Then take no more mercy at the hand of thy God! Give back the marriage ring of love that Jesus put on your finger in the day of your espousal! Plant no more of the flowers of heaven where there ought to be nothing but nettles and nightshade!

The Gospel of Courage. We try to make this church a cheerful church. A man on Saturday afternoon stands in his store and says: "How shall

I meet these obligations? How can I endure this new disaster that is coming upon me?" He goes home. Sabbath morning finds him in the house of God.

Through the song, through the sermon, through the prayer, the Lord Jesus Christ says to that man: "O man, I have watched thee. I have seen all thy struggles. It is enough. I will see thee through. I will stand between thee and thy creditors. I will make up in heavenly treasures what you have lost in earthly treasures. Courage, man, courage!

Angels of God, I command you to clear the track for that man; put your wings over his head; with your golden scepters strike for his defense; throw around him all the defenses of eternity." What is the consequence? That business man is strengthened. He goes to the store next day feeling that God is with him and ready to deliver.

That same Sunday there is a poor old woman in the church hearing the gospel.

Oh, how shrunken she is! She wears the same dress she wore 20 years ago. How faded it is and now out of date! She sits and listens as well as she can. Her eyes are so dim she cannot see half way across the church. Her ear is so imperfect that she can only catch occasionally a note of the psalm or a word of the preacher.

Some one sitting next to her gives her a book and finds the place for her. She says, "Thank you, miss; thank you."

She holds the book close up to her eyes and with a voice all full of tremors sings:

Jesus, lover of my soul, Let me to thy bosom fly While the billows near me roil, While the tempest still is high. Hide me, O my Saviour, hide Till the storm of life is past. Safe into the haven guide--Oh, receive my soul at last.

And Jesus says to her, "Mother, are you weary?" And she says, "Yes, Jesus, I am very tired." Jesus says, "Mother, are you poor?" And she says: "Yes, I am very poor. I cannot sew any more. I cannot knit any more. I am very poor."

Jesus says to her, "Mother, would you like to rest?" She says, "Yes, Lord; that is what I want--rest." "Courage, mother," says Jesus, "I will see thee through."

She goes home. The next morning in the tenement home some one dwelling on another floor comes to her room and knocks. No answer. The door is opened.

She is dead! The night before the chari-

ots of God halted at that pillow of straw, and Jesus kept his promise. He said that he would give her rest and he has given her rest. Glory be to God for the height, the depth, the length and the breadth of such Christian comfort! Oh, that we might have such joy as that which inspired the men at the battle of Leuthen! They were singing a Chris-

tian song as they went into battle. A general said to the king, "Shall I stop those people singing?" "No," said the king. "Men that sing like that can fight." I would that we had a singing church, a joyful church, a jubilant church, a comforting church, for then we would have a triumphant church.

An Up to Date Church. I remark, further, that we have here tried to build a church abreast of the times. It is all folly for us to try to do things the way they did 50 or 100 years ago. We might as well be plowing with Elijah's crooked stick, or go into battle with Saul's armor, or prefer a canalboat to an express train, as to be clinging to

old things. What we most need now is a wide awake church. People who are out in the world all the week, jostling against this lightning footed century, come into the church on the Sabbath and go right to sleep unless they have a spir-

rited service. Men engaged in literary callings all the week, reading pungent, sharp writings, cannot be expected to

come and hear our ecclesiastical humdrum.

If a man stays at home on Sundays and reads the newspapers, it is because the newspapers are more interesting. We need, my brethren, to rouse up and stop hunting with blank cartridges. The church of God ought to be the leader, the interpreter, the inspirer of the age.

It is all folly for us to be discussing old issues--arraigning Nero, hanging Absa-

lom, striking the Philistines with Sham-

gar's ox goad--when all around us are iniquities to be slain.

Did I say that the church ought to be abreast of the times? I take that back. The church of God ought to be ahead of the times--as far in advance as the cross of Christ is ahead of all human invention. Paul was 1,000 years ahead of the day in which he lived. The swift footed years that have passed since Luther died have not yet come up to Luther's grave. Give iniquity 4,000 years the start, and the feet of Christianity are so nimble that if you will but give it full swing it will catch up and pass it in two bounds. The church of God ought to be ahead of the times.

A Church That Converts. I remark, further, that we have tried here, in the love and fear of God, to built a church that would be characterized by conversions. I have heard of very good people who could preach for 15 or 20 years and see no conversions, but yet have faith. It takes a very good man to do that. I do not know how a man can keep his faith up if souls are not brought to the Lord Jesus Christ. That church that does not bring men and women to the feet of the Saviour is a failure. I care not how fine the building, or how sweet the music, or how eloquent the preaching, or how elegant the surround-ings--it is a failure. The church of God was made for just one thing--to get men out of the world into the kingdom of heaven. The tendency in churches is to spend their time in giving fine touches to Christians already polished. We keep our religion too much indoors and under shelter, when it ought to be climbing the rocks or hewing in the forests. Then it would be a stalwart religion, a robust religion, a religion able to digest the strong meat of the word, instead of being kept on the pap and gruel of spiritual invalidism. It is high time that we threw off the Sunday clothes of sickly sentimentality and put on the workday dress of earnest, active Christianity. Here is Brooklyn, here is New York, here are the United States, here is the whole world, to be converted. It is 1,894 years since Christ came, and yet Europe, Asia, Africa, North and South America are still unevangelized. More people born every year into the world than are

born into the kingdom of God. At that rate I ask any one who can do a simple sum in arithmetic to calculate when this world will be brought to Jesus. At that ratio, never, never, never! And yet we know that it is to be brought to Christ.

But the church will have to change its tack and take a wider sweep with the gospel net than any it has yet taken. I believe that the great masses of the peo-

ple are now ready to receive the gospel if we give them a chance.

A boy goes along the street at night and sees a fine house beautifully lighted up and hears music, and he says, "I wish I was in there, but I have not been invited," and so he passes on. Here is the church of God, lighted up with festivity and holy mirth, and the world passes along outside, hears the music and sometimes wishes it was inside, but says that it is not invited. Oh, invite the world to come in! Go out into the highways and hedges. Send a ticket of invitation printed in these words, "Come, for all things are now ready."

Some years ago 200 men were buried in the Hartley colliery of England. The queen of England from her throne tele-

graphed, "Is there any hope for the men?" After awhile the answer came over the wires: "No hope. They are dead." Here is a whole race buried in sin and darkness and woe. The question that thrills up to the throne of God today is, "Is there any hope for the men?" Answering intelligence comes back from the throne of God, thrilling through the world's darkness, thrilling through the world's woe: "Yes. Hope for one, hope for all! Whosoever will let him come. And the spirit and the bride say, 'Come. And let him that is athirst come.'"

A Message From the Almighty.

We have had conventions all over the country discussing the subject, "How Shall the Great Masses Be Brought to Christ?" They have passed splendid resolutions at the close of the meeting--a long list of 8, 10 or 15 have been read, and then the presiding officer has said, "All those in favor of the resolution for the conversion of the world, purifying the cities and redeeming the masses and making everything all right say aye." "Aye, aye!" say a thousand voices. "All opposed to--no." "The ayes have it." There, the whole world is converted! Ah, we do not seem to get along by such a process.

If this world is ever to be brought to God, it will not be by the handful of ministers we have in this country. It will be by the great masses of Christian men and women discharging their duty. If the private church membership of this

country would but put on their armor and go forth, I believe that in 15 years this whole land would be redeemed for Christ. Would God that all the people were prophets! I am never afraid to hear a man say that he is going to preach. If he cannot preach, people will not go to hear him. If he can, he has a message from the Almighty, and I would have him deliver it. Look out how you interfere with him.

Since we have been together as a pastor and people, how many have been promoted to the glories of heaven? They died sweetly, calmly, as only Christians can die. They have put down the staff of their pilgrimage. They have taken up the palm of the victor. The Lord Jesus has swung his arm through this church a good many times. He has been up and down all these aisles. He has taken the little children--dear little children. He came down into the garden to gather the lilies and the aged as well. One who sat right here, so that when I used to preach I could almost put my hand on his head, when I came back from my summer vacation was gone. Oh, how the glories of heaven shone around that old man's face as he sat here Sabbath after Sabbath! Gone now. Happy spirit, Happy with all those who have passed the flood. One army of the living God To his command we bow. Part of the host have crossed the flood, And part are crossing now.

A Brief Farewell.

I thank you for all your kindness, for all your sympathy, for all your prayers for me as a pastor. It is a sorrow to me that I am to be absent even for a few months. I have worked to the full ex-

tent of physical, mental and spiritual endurance for this church.

Now we start out on our twenty-sixth year. How many of us will close it here I know not. But, living or dying, let us cling to Christ. Oh, that all the people would love him! I wish that I could take this audience this morning and wreath it around the heart of my Lord Jesus Christ! Oh, he is such a dear Saviour! He is such a loving Jesus! He is so precious! He is all the world to me. He is heaven to me. He washed away my sins. He comforted me in days of darkness and trouble. He is mine. Oh, blessed Jesus! Sweetest sound I ever heard or ever expect to hear is thy name!

My closing prayer this morning is that God will have mercy on the dying population of our great cities, and that the whole earth will put on bridal array for the coming of the Lord. Ride on, King Jesus; ride on! Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting, and let the whole earth be filled with his glory! Amen and amen!

One Legged Senators. Say what they will, the associates of Senator Berry of Arkansas cannot persuade him to try a cork leg. At one time there were four one legged senators. Three of them half concealed the loss with artificial substitutes. They used to get together in the cloakroom and tell each other how much more comfortable they felt, but they never convinced Sena-

tor Berry. He clings to his crutches, notwithstanding they have failed him more than once and sent him headfore-

most down stairs almost to his death.

There are funny things about this one legged business. Henderson of Iowa, the Dubuque veteran, manages so well that people form his acquaintance and see him around for weeks without learning that he is part cork. Once in awhile the stump becomes sensitive, and Mr. Henderson leaves the artificial leg at home for a few days to rest himself, while he hobbles about the house of representatives on crutches, to the amusement of those who have not known him long. A senator who manages an artificial leg without awkwardness is Butler of South Carolina. He carries a cane and moves with some deliberation, but not one person in 100 passing him on the street detects any stiffness in the gait.--Washing-ton Letter.

Perished on the Desert.

A few days ago Loreto Villa, in charge of the cattle herds of the Ellison brothers, along the Cocopah mountains, left Black Butte for Campo, Cal. Later, his mule returned to camp without him. A search was instituted, which resulted in the finding of his saddle hanging on a bush about a mile from camp. The Cocopah Indians followed the mule's tracks back to Desert Springs, about half way

between Signal mountains and Coyote Wells, where Villa's tracks showed that he had got off his mule to water him at the spring, when the mule, which was a

bad one, got away and ran home, a distance of 40 miles.

Villa tried to follow, and when he had gone about half way wandered off into the sand hills, where he threw away his shoes and where his tracks were obliter-

ated by the winds. The tracks of two other men were also found in the same sand hills. They are supposed to be those of two prospectors named Ross and Williams. These add three more names to the desert's dead, and these perished in sight of the spot where the Breedloves were found dead more than a year ago.

Cost of Finishing a Girl.

It costs $200 a year to finish a girl's education in the fashionable schools of New York. This is for English, etiquette, good form, lectures, drawing room association and French conversa-

tion, the language of the house. Music and the other fine arts and modern and dead languages are extra. The students dress for dinner every evening. Twice a week they are at home, and with the parents' consent they may receive gen-

tlemen. Formerly girls were taught to become ladies. The term has been so abused that it is ignored, and the student's ambition is to become a gentle- woman.--Exchange.

Reducing the Strain. "Mr. Pennersby," said the city editor to the reporter, "did you write this sen-tence--'the congressman stood speechless with amazement?'" "Yes. Is there anything wrong with it?" "Well, I don't know. Unless you are very sure of your facts, we'd better change it to 'the congressman was amazed.'"--Washington Star. A Suffering Country. Mrs. Snarl--The papers say that russet shoes are going out of fashion. Mr. Snarl (who has two pairs on hand) --Huh! That's the way things go in this country. I'll bet the Italian bootblacking monopoly has subsidized the press."--New York Weekly. Professor Garner says that gorillas do not converse with chimpanzees.

AN INCIDENT IN REAL LIFE. Showing How Unpleasant People Can Make Themselves by Their Talk. I stepped upon a Broadway car at the lower end of Broadway and rode in it along the fast changing highway as far as Nineteenth street. At the corner of Chambers street and Broadway a man of perhaps 40 and a woman not more than 25, he carrying a huge portmanteau, a collection of wraps, two umbrellas and a cane, she leading by the hand a 3-year-old baby, joined the partially crowded patronage already seated. A cloud of dissatisfaction rested upon the brow of the man. The frown of an already born rumpus fast unfolding into fruitage made forbidding and ugly the comely countenance of the woman. Her nervous disposition made itself known to every one in the car and particularly to the little boy as she yanked the child by the arm and into the seat beside her. After a moment's silence the woman said, "You might have known how it would be," to which he responded, "Well, I might have known, but I didn't, so shut up!"

Another passenger entered the car at that moment and stumbled over the portmeanteau. "Hang that bag!" said the man.

"If I were you, I would keep my cussing for home," said the woman, and so on and on and on.

The ensuing half hour was passed by these two in a strain which would have done credit to the most pronounced hag in the dirtiest quarters of a third rate fish market. The little boy, thank heavens, went fast asleep. Much of the conversation between the two was inaudible save to the three or four people in imme-

diate contact with them, but every once in awhile the shrill voice of the female bird soared into upper altitudes of defiance, making discordant the entire atmosphere and attracting the attention of nearly a score of people. They got out at the corner of Fourteenth street and Broadway and entered a cafe--he sullen, ejaculatory and profane; she keyed up to G in alt, defiant, shrewish, chock full of scold. Well, what of it? It is not such a very uncommon thing for man and wife--for lovers even, for daily intercoursers--to quarrel and to vent serpentlike hisses from the unruly members that wag with curious motion as they distill poison from bitter and jaundiced hearts. It is not so uncommon, I admit, but isn't it always suggestive? I thought as I looked at the man, with a good, square, clean forehead, well marked brows, a clear skin and an air of self poise, that he was hardly doing himself justice. Save that his hands were rude and rough and that his boots were country made, that his portmanteau was considerably older than the ordinary hill and that his umbrella looked as though it might have been utilized by Mrs. Noah when she came from the ark, he was a man of the world in appearance.

And the woman had a pretty face. Her hair was parted in the middle, as women's hair should be, and revealed in its old fashioned brushing a tiny ear, not so small as to indicate utter selfishness, but, on the other hand, not so large as to rival a genuine Saddle Rock oyster in its vulgarity. Her eyes were brown; soft at that; her teeth were regular and clean; her dress was neat, her hands and feet well clad, and an occasional pat upon the boy's shoulder as he lay nes-

tling against her, fast asleep, indicated the feminine nature, the affectionate ten-

derness of the mother. Listening under the circumstances was not rudeness. It was compulsory. I sat next the boy. Some of his banana skin ornaments my coatsleeve until this mo-

ment. As he lay semicoiled up I noticed the copper nails in the bottom of his shoe and the copper toe upon the same. The group was easily and perfectly within my vision. As word after word fell red hot I thought: How odd this all would have sounded in that shell-like ear five years ago. How strange it would have seemed to the lover had he heard it or had it been suggested to him that ever it could be possible for him to hear such language from such lips.--Howard in New York Recorder.

A Printer's Curious Theft.

Twenty years ago the Cincinnati, Hamilton and Indiana Railroad com-

pany issued a lot of bonds payable in 1903. The bonds were for $1,000, with interest at 7 per cent. per annum, pay-

able semiannually. The printing was done in Cincinnati and the coupons were presented in New York for payment. For a long time the officers of the company have been satisfied that there was something wrong in the bond deal, but were unable to find out what it was until a few days ago.

When the coupon of bond No. 3,319 was presented for payment at the New York office the first of this month it was noticed that the number was written in blue ink instead of red ink, as was used on the other coupons. The coupon was sent from 208 Forquer street, Chicago and was payable to S. A. Brewer.

The auditor of the road went to Chicago and reported the matter at the cen-

tral station. Friday night detectives ar-

rested Brewer. A special from Chicago says: "Brewer admitted having sent the coupon to New York, but that M. A. Reed had the bond. Reed was arrested and the bond found in his possession. Both men are printers employed in Chicago. Reed said he was employed in the office in Cincinnati where the bonds were printed 20 years ago and had stolen one of them. He forged the signatures of the officers of the road to the bond and had successfully collected the interest on the cou-

pons during all of these years. The amount of interest collected on the stolen bond by Reed amounts to $1,435. The men will be taken back to Cincinnati to stand trial."--Cincinnati Commercial-Gazette.

Johnson and Millar.

When Johnson, in 1753, sent the conclusion of his dictionary to Millar, the publisher, that gentleman sent him the final payment and expressed thanks to God that he had done with him, whereupon Johnson made reply that he was glad to find that Millar had the grace to thank God for anything.--Minneapolis Housekeeper.

Transparent.

Groom (on tour)--Everybody in the dining room must have seen through us.

Bride--It was our own fault! We made perfect spectacles of ourselves.--Detroit Tribune.

The Henry [?] of King's Daughters, composed of eight members, reports that last year it chloroformed 1,000 cats, 71 dogs, 6 wounded sparrows, 1 rabbit and 1 opossum.

GREAT BARGAINS IN SPRING & SUMMER CLOTHING, Hats, Caps and Gents Furnishing Goods, AT M. MENDEL'S RELIABLE ONE PRICE STORE. 1625 ATLANTIC AVENUE, ATLANTIC CITY, N. J. Children's Nobby Clothing a Specialty. A Banjo Souvenier Given Away with every Child's Suit.

HOTEL BRIGHTON, R. R. SOOY, Proprietor. SEVENTH AND OCEAN AVENUE, OCEAN CITY, NEW JERSEY. FIRST-CLASS HOUSE. DIRECTLY ON THE BEACH.

Y. CORSON, REAL ESTATE AGENT, AND LICENSED AUCTIONEER, No. 721 Asbury Avenue, OCEAN CITY, N. J. Properties for sale. Boarding Houses and Cottages for Rent in all parts of the city. Correspondence solicited. WM. LAKE, C. E., REAL ESTATE AGENT, Surveying, Conveyancing, Commissioner of Deeds, Notary Public, Master in Chancery. Sec'y Ocean City Building and Loan Association. Lots for Sale or Exchange. Houses to rent, furnished or unfurnished. Deeds, Bonds, Mortgages, Wills and Contracts carefully drawn. Abstracts of titles carefully prepared. Experience of more than twenty-five years. Office--Sixth Street and Asbury Avenue. P. O. Box 825. WM. LAKE.

E. B. LAKE, SUPERINTENDENT OF OCEAN CITY ASSOCIATION From its Organization, and also REAL ESTATE AGENT

Having thousands of Building Lots for sale at various prices, Some very Cheap and located in all parts of Ocean City. Now is the time to purchase property before the second railroad comes, as then property will greatly advance.

I have a good many Inquiries for Property between 6th and 12th streets. Any one having property for sale might do well to give me their prices. All persons desiring to Buy, or Sell, or Exchange property, would do well before closing any transaction to call on or address E. B. LAKE, Association Office, No. 601 Asbury Ave., Ocean City, N. J.

DESIRABLE COTTAGES FOR SALE OR RENT. If you intend visiting the seashore the coming season, call on or write call on or write R. CURTIS ROBINSON, REAL ESETATE AND INSURNACE AGENT, 744 ASBURY AVENUE, OCEAN CITY, N. J.,

who has on hand a number of desirable furnished and unfurnished cottages. Full information given on application.

Building lots for sale in every section of the city. Insurance written by first class Companies. Come and see me before insuring elsewhere.

Money to loan on Bond and Mortgage on Improved Property.