Harper's Young People, June 29, 1880 Part 10

I am collecting postage stamps, and would like to exchange with some of the readers of YOUNG PEOPLE. I have nine hundred and seventy-six different kinds.

LEON M. FOBES, No. 22 Cushman Street, Portland, Maine.

I am thirteen years old, and I live on the right bank of the Pecatonica River. If C. B. F. will look in a good encyclopedia, he will find out a good deal about ants. I have a dog and a cat, and a great many pigeons and chickens. I was out with my mamma the other day, and we found ferns three feet high.

I have a collection of birds' eggs, and would like to exchange with any of the readers of YOUNG PEOPLE.

CHARLES J. BURCHARD, Freeport, Illinois.

We have some of the handsomest white roses here that I ever saw.

When they first open, they are tinted cream-color. I live on the Pecatonica River, and we have a boat. I think it is very nice to ride in it.

I would be very much obliged if Harry H. M., of Windsor, Connecticut, or some other correspondent, would send me a pressed trailing arbutus, as I never saw any of that flower. I will exchange some of our pressed flowers for it.

CARRIE HARDING, Freeport, Illinois.

I am twelve years old, but people think I am older, because I am so tall. We have a great many pets. We have a white horse, a black and white coach dog, a Maltese cat, and two kittens; and mamma has just raised a brood of four canaries, but the cat caught one of them.

My sister and I tried Nellie H.'s recipe for candy.

I would like to exchange pressed flowers with Genevieve of California. I have already pressed a few.

HATTIE D. CONDON, P. O. Box 98, Ipswich, Ma.s.sachusetts.

E. G. KOCH.--The best thing for you to do is to go to Prospect Park Lake, Brooklyn, any pleasant Sat.u.r.day afternoon, where you can witness the regatta, and learn full particulars concerning the yacht club.

W. B. A. S.--The loon is found in all the Northern States. It is a very awkward bird on land, but a graceful and rapid swimmer. It is a remarkable diver, and it is thought that no other feathered creature can dive so far beneath the surface or remain so long a time under water. A specimen was once found attached to the hook of a fisherman's set line in Seneca Lake, it having dived nearly one hundred feet to reach the bait. It feeds on lizards, fish, frogs, all kinds of aquatic insects, and the roots of fresh-water plants, usually swallowing its food under water. It is a very large bird, about three feet in length, and spreads its wings fully five feet. It builds its nest in marshes, near water, of rushes and gra.s.s, which it twists together in a huge heap on the ground, usually among tall reeds. The eggs, usually three in number, are a little over three inches long, and in color of a dull greenish ochre, with indistinct spots of dark umber, most numerous toward the broad end.

During the winter this bird lives near the sea-sh.o.r.e, especially in the salt-marshes on the Long Island coast, and along the sh.o.r.es of the Chesapeake; but in the summer it goes as far north as Maine, and breeds there in great quant.i.ties.

EDITH H.--The peculiar spots often found on lemons and oranges are only a natural appearance of the skin of certain varieties. Havana oranges and the best Floridas are more marked in this way than other kinds.

A. R. A.--Your Wiggles are remarkably pretty, but they came too late to be engraved.

A. U. Y.--j.a.panese wine-flowers can be obtained in New York at nearly every store where toys, novelties, and apparatus for parlor magic are sold. They are also called Surprises, or j.a.panese Curiosos.

Favors are acknowledged from Carrie E. Lucas, Julia T., Charles and Fred W., Harry L. Chase, Bertha Frederick, Aggie M. Mason, Leon Munroe, Edmund I. Sheppard, John J. A. F., Graham Hereford, Emmie L. Brazier, M.

Welchman, J. M. T., John H. Bartlett, W. Lloyd Clark, Rosa Hickman, Hugh D.

Correct answers to puzzles are received from Alexander Maxwell, Charles E. Boehler, Charlie D. Cutter, Roscoe E. Elwell, Altia R. Austin, J. F. S., William I. Coleman, Maud and Gertie, A. H. Ellard, Maud Matthewson, "Fatinitza," Perry Von Olker, Cora R. Price, Cora Frost, Fred Purdy.

PUZZLES FROM YOUNG CONTRIBUTORS.

No. 1.

WORD SQUARE.

First, a native of a certain country. Second, not under. Third, a flower. Fourth, the imperfect form of a verb.

EDDIE.

No. 2.

DIAMOND.

A consonant. A t.i.tle. A warlike tribe of Indians. An intoxicating liquor. A consonant.

S. F. W.

No. 3.

HOUR-GLa.s.s PUZZLE.

To flourish. One universally shunned. A snare. In Daniel. A species of tree. Actions. Deportment. Centrals read downward spell the name of an early English poet.

"LONE STAR."

No. 4.

ENIGMA.

My first is in up, but not in down.

My second is in smile, but not in frown.

My third is in eat, but not in drink.