While the doctors are watching for cripples, they also examine the immigrants carefully, to see that they have not any kind of sickness. Only healthy immigrants are allowed to land, sick people being sent back. When the immigrants have passed the doctors, they then reach the clerks, who must be satisfied that they have money, or friends in the country, before they give them permission to land. People who come without money are divided from the rest, and are taken before a board of inquiry. Here they are asked why they came to the country. If they have friends who have sent for them, and who agree to feed and shelter them, they are allowed to pass. If no friends come for them, they are kept on Ellis Island till their friends are found; and if no friends are found, they are sent back to their own country. When they have been passed from Ellis Island the immigration law has not done with them. The law says that no charity shall be given to an immigrant who has been in this country for less than a year. Any person who asks for help, and has been less than a year over here, is sent back to Ellis Island, and from thence he is carried back to his own country by the same steamship company that brought him. So you see that the laws are almost strict enough now, and the immigrants who succeed in passing through Ellis Island are a good, solid class of people, who are likely to become worthy citizens. * * * * * Did you ever hear a singing mouse? A man wrote a long story to _The Sun_, a few days ago, telling how he was awakened one night, and frightened out of his wits by hearing a noise like the peeping of a chicken in the adjoining room. He got up and lit the gas, and saw a little brown mouse run across the floor. He set a trap, caught the mouse, which was no sooner in the trap than it began to sing. The man whistled to it, and the little creature replied. The man did not seem to realize that he had found a great prize, but pretending that his wife was afraid of the mouse, he drowned it in a pail of water. When it was safely dead, he began to search through his encyclopedia to see what kind of a "beastie" he had caught. But the encyclopedia, as studied by the good man, did not seem to be any wiser than he, and he finally wrote a note to the newspaper for information. [Illustration] It is a great pity he did not keep the mouse until he had looked the matter up, for chance had sent him a very gentle and charming little pet. His singing mouse was a deer or white-foot mouse. This mouse is found all over the United States, and while several other kinds are known to sing, the deer-mouse is the sweetest of the singers. These mice can be very easily tamed, and live happily in cages, like dormice. In "Nature's Wonderland" an interesting story is told of a deer-mouse which was a famous singer. It was owned by Dr. Lockwood, who was so pleased with its songs, that he set them to music, and gave them names.