“Now for the whole,” said John Osborne, as he made his way off the stage over a heap of umbrellas.

“I can’t think why the lady from Philadelphia did not send me the whole,” said Elizabeth Eliza, musing over the letter.

“Listen, they are guessing,” said John Osborne. “‘D-ice-box.’  I don’t wonder they get it wrong.”

“But we know it can’t be that!” exclaimed Elizabeth Eliza, in agony.  “How can we act the whole if we don’t know it ourselves!”

“Oh, I see it!” said Ann Maria, clapping.  “Get your whole family in for the last scene.”

Mr. and Mrs. Peterkin were summoned to the stage, and formed the background, standing on stools; in front were Agamemnon and Solomon John, leaving room for Elizabeth Eliza between; a little in advance, and in front of all, half kneeling, were the little boys in their India rubber boots.

The audience rose to an exclamation of delight, “the Peterkins!”

It was not until this moment that Elizabeth Eliza guessed the whole.

“What a tableau!” exclaimed Mr. Bromwich; “the Peterkin family guessing their own charade.”

A DOUBLE RIDDLE.[A]

BY J.G.H.

  There is a word of music’s own
    That lifts the soul to see and do,—­
  A happy word, that leaps alone
    From lips by pleasure touched anew,

  Which, if it join thy parted name,
    O Blessed Virgin! bears a curse,
  Than which the fatal midnight flame,
    Or fateful war, holds nothing worse!

  What is this word, with baleful charm,
    To change the sweetest name we know
  To one surcharged with subtile harm?—­
    And what the strange, new name of woe?

  And if you guess this riddle well,
    And speak this word in answer true,
  How may it lift—­I pray you tell—­
    The tuneful soul to see and do?

[Footnote A:  The answer will be given in “Letter-Box” of January number.]

UNDER THE LILACS

BY LOUISA M. ALCOTT.

CHAPTER 1

A MYSTERIOUS DOG.

The elm-tree avenue was all overgrown, the great gate was never unlocked, and the old house had been shut up for several years.  Yet voices were heard about the place, the lilacs nodded over the high wall as if they said, “We could tell fine secrets if we chose,” and the mullein outside the gate made haste to reach the keyhole that it might peep in and see what was going on.

If it had suddenly grown up like a magic bean-stalk, and looked in on a certain June day, it would have seen a droll but pleasant sight, for somebody evidently was going to have a party.