Open the snowy little bed, And put the baby in it; Lay down her pretty curly head, She'll go to sleep in a minute. Tuck the sheet down round her neck, And cover the dimples over, Till she looks like a rose-bud peeping out From a bed of sweet white clover. HOW THE STONE-AGE CHILDREN PLAYED. BY CHARLES C. ABBOTT. Not long since I wandered along a pretty brook that rippled through a narrow valley. I was on the lookout for whatever birds might be wandering that way, but saw nothing of special interest. So, to while away the time, I commenced geologizing; and, as I plodded along my lonely way, I saw everywhere traces of an older time, when the sparkling rivulet that now only harbors pretty salamanders was a deep creek, tenanted by many of our larger fishes. How fast the earth from the valley's slopes may have been loosened by frost and washed by freshet, and carried down to fill up the old bed of the stream, we will not stop to inquire; for other traces of this older time were also met with here. As I turned over the loose earth by the brook-side, and gathered here and there a pretty pebble, I chanced upon a little arrow-point. [Illustration: THE HATCHET.] Whoever has made a collection, be it of postage stamps or birds' eggs, knows full well how securing one coveted specimen but increases eagerness for others; and so was it with me, that pleasant afternoon. Just one pretty arrow-point cured me of my laziness, banished every trace of fatigue, and filled me with the interest of eager search; and I dug and sifted and washed the sandy soil for yards along the brook-side, until I had gathered at least a score of curious relics of the long-departed red men, or rather of the games and sports and pastimes of the red men's hardy and active children. [Illustration: ARROW-HEADS.] For centuries before Columbus discovered San Salvador, the red men (or Indians, as they are usually called) roamed over all the great continent of North America, and, having no knowledge of iron as a metal, they were forced to make of stone or bone all their weapons, hunting and household implements. From this fact they are called, when referring to those early times, a stone-age people, and so, of course, the boys and girls of that time were stone-age children. But it is not to be supposed that because the children of savages they were altogether unlike the youngsters of to-day. In one respect, at least, they were quite the same--they were very fond of play. Their play, however, was not like the games of to-day, as you may see by the pictures of their toys. We might, perhaps, call the principal game of the boys "Playing Man," for the little stone implements, here pictured, are only miniatures of the great stone axes and long spear-points of their fathers.