Page:The Green Bag (1889–1914), Volume 04.pdf/32

 The Ordeal in Africa. there smoke them. By the advice of a friendly old woman, Yeo contrived to con ceal a large sponge moistened with water in the room, and when the smoke became trou blesome, held it to her mouth and nostrils; and so it came to pass that when the door

ON A MORTGAGEE

was opened, her companions were found dead; but Yeo stepped triumphantly out of the chamber, to be at once declared no ble and legitimate, and see her son ac knowledged as the rightful monarch of the islands. — Chambers' Journal.

IN

POSSESSION.

As one wrecked in mid-ocean, who surveys From his lone islet how the boundless main Bears neither help, nor hope that e'er again His foot shall tread the city's crowded ways; And, sinking, sees, with memory's inward gaze, The white sails filling seaward, and the strain Of mast and spar, and so recalls with pain Youth's golden vision of Saturnian days : So stands the man surrounded by a sea, Whose perils scarce with pain he shall surmount, Who takes possession as a mortgagee. Beati possidentis?

Nay, the fount

Of evil shall possession to him be, From whom the law exacts a strict account! Lays of a Limb of the Law.

1

17