THE YOUTH’S CABINET.

struck out for a rock that lay about
seventy yards in the sea, on which they
were shortly seated, and from which
they gave three hearty cheers. Their
companions attempted to procure their
rescue by obtaining a boat, but owing to
the breach in the ledge, found it impos-
sible, and had to proceed onward for
more than three hours, before they were
able to extricate themselves.

To their delight, the geologists then
found that their brave companions had
swam to an accessible part of the cliff,
and returned to Llanrhystid, not a whit
the worse from their perilous adventure.
Selected.

The Rat with a Bell.

A FABLE.

Lance old house in the country

was so infested with rats, that
nothing could be secure from
theirdepredations. They scaled

the walls, to attack flitches of bacon,
though hung as high as the ceiling.
Hanging shelves afforded no protection
to the cheese and pastry. They pene-
trated by sap into the store-room, and
plundered it of preserves and sweet-
meats, They gnawed through cupboard
doors, undermined floors, and ran races
behind the wainscots. The cats could
not get at them; they were too cunning
and too well fed to meddle with poison ;
and traps only now and then caught a
heedless straggler. One of these, how-
ever, on being taken, was the occasion
of practicing a new device.

 

This was, to |

111

fasten a collar with a small bell about
the prisoner’s neck, and then turn him
loose again.

Overjoyed at the recovery of his liber-

ty, the rat ran into the nearest hole, and
went in search of his companions.
heard, at a distance, the bell tinkle-tin-
kle through the dark passages, and sus-
pecting some enemy had got in among
them, away they scoured, some one way
and some another.
sued; and soon guessing the cause of
their flight, he was greatly amused by it.
Wherever he approached, it was all hur-
ry-scurry, and not a tail of one of them

They

The bell-bearer pur-

was to be seen. He chased his old
friends from hole to hole, and room to

room, laughing all the while at their

fears, and increasing them by all the
means in his power. Presently, he had
the whole house to himself. ‘That's
right,” quoth he ; “the fewer, the better
cheer.” So he rioted alone among the
good things, and stuffed till he could
hardly walk... :

For two or three days, this course of
life went on very pleasantly. He ate,
and ate, and played the bugbear to per-
fection. At length, he grew tired of
this lonely condition, and longed to mix
with his companions again upon the for-
mer footing. But the difficulty was,
how to get rid of his bell. He pulled

| and tugged with his fore-feet, and almost

wore the skin off his neck in the attempt,
but all in vain. The bell was now his
plague and torment. He wandered from
room to room, earnestly desiring to make
himself known to one of his companions,
but they all kept out of his reach. At
last, as he was moping about disconso-
late, he fell in puss’s way, and was de-
voured in an instant,—Selected,