Belinda Blonde was a beautiful doll, With rosy-red cheeks and a flaxen poll; Her lips were red, and her eyes were blue, But to say she was happy would not be true; For she pined for love of the great big Jack Who lived in the box so grim and black. She never had looked on the Jack his face, But she fancied him shining with beauty and grace; And all the day long she would murmur and pout, Because Jack-in-the-box would never come out. "Oh, beautiful, beautiful Jack-in-the-box! Undo your bolts and undo your locks! The cupboard is shut, and there's no one about; Oh, Jack-in-the-box! jump out, jump out!" But alas, alas for Belinda Blonde! And alas, alas for her dreamings fond! There soon was an end to all her doubt, For Jack-in-the-box really _did_ jump out!-- Out with a crash, and out with a spring, Half black and half scarlet, a horrible thing; Out with a yell and out with a shout, His great goggle-eyes glaring wildly about. "Alas! alas!" cried Belinda Blonde; "Is this the end of my dreamings fond? Is this my love, and is this my dear, This hideous, glowering monster here? Alas! alas!" cried Belinda fair. She wrung her hands and she tore her hair, Till at length, as the dolls who were witnesses say, She fell on the ground and she fainted away. MORAL. Now all you dolls, both little and big, With china crown and with curling wig, Before you give way to affection fond, Remember the fate of Belinda Blonde; And unless you wish to get terrible knocks, Don't set your heart on a Jack-in-the-box. THE LONDON DUST-MAN BY ALEXANDER WAINWRIGHT. There he goes! A dusky gloom hangs over the roofs of great London City; a similar gloom fills my room and seems to have touched all the furniture with smoky age, and as I look down from the window into the gloomy street, I see him coming along slowly, and crying in a voice like a plea for help in affliction: "Dust-oh!--dust-oh!--dust-oh!--dust-oh!" Not one of the many citizens who are passing notices him, or finds anything strange in that plaintive cry. The people who live in the city see him day after day, and remember how, in their childhood, they had terrifying notions of his weakness for kidnapping and other mysterious wickednesses. They know better now, and hurry past him with scarcely a glance; but to the American visitor he is something of a curiosity. [Illustration: "DUST-OH!"]