The pupils in a school in Boston were asked to give in writing the difference between a biped and a quadruped. One boy gave the following: "A biped has two legs and a quadruped has four legs, therefore, the difference between a biped and a quadruped is two legs." Mistress--Oh, Briget! Briget! What an awful numbskull you are! You've put the potatoes on the table with their skins on, right in front of our visitors, too. You--you--what shall I call you? Briget (affably)--Call me "Agnes," if ye loike, mum; 'tis me other name. A real joke was sprung by a student at the Western Reserve University last week. This student suffers from the stigma of obesity; it appears that even professors do not love a fat man. After a particularly unsuccessful recitation in English III., the professor said: "Alas, Mr. Blank! You are better fed than taught." "That's right, professor," sighed the youth, subsiding heavily. "You teach me--I feed myself." A writer in the Philadelphia Saturday Evening Post tells of a big, overgrown, bashful booby of a farmer's boy who was afraid even to speak to a girl, and whose father one day finally lost patience and scolded him roundly for not looking about and finding some girl to marry. "Why," he said, "at your age I had been married three years and had a house and farm of my own!" "Well, but, dad," complained the boy, "that ain't the same thing at all. You only had to marry mother, while I've got to go and hunt up some strange girl and ask her to marry me!" * * * * * THE MARSHLEA TRAGEDY By Col. Ralph Fenton Three years ago I went down to Marshlea to spend the summer. It is a sea-breezy, bird-singing country, and the Ocean House, having been taken by a friend of mine for the season, I knew I should have unexceptionable quarters, and "rust" as my friend Charley Williard says, to my heart's content. Change of scene is a good thing, but utter solitude, under the names of rustication and rest, is a penalty I never willingly undergo. I knew that there would be plenty of people at Marshlea--people in undress and holiday tempers--fashionables exhibiting, scholars seeking, invalids languishing, flirts flirting, and many good people simply enjoying relief from care and the salubrious situation. I expected as much of the people as I did of the place, and accepted them quite as willingly. My quarters were comfortable, a cool northeast room and a little east bedroom looking upon the sea, both rooms furnished freely in bamboo and India matting. I wheeled my bed so that I could see the sun rise in the morning, quite comfortable, and with no thanks to Mr. Bierstadt, and heard the gong sound two hours later, while I was reading Thackeray. I never took morning sea-baths--they did not agree with my constitution--but at noon, when the tide lapped the shingles, full of a soft wash and warm swells, I took a stretch of half a mile, and felt the better for my tonic.