With rosy checks, and laughing eyes,
      They hie to Nature’s bowers,
    While birds trill forth their sweetest lay,
      To pluck the fairest flowers.

    Now some have strayed to sit beneath
      A grove of maples grey,
    To twine their flowers into a wreath,
      Or cull a sweet bouquet.

    While one small group is seated round
      A florid, mossy knoll,
    And laughing lisp that they have found
      The sweetest flowers of all.

    With bouquets sweet, and garlands gay,
      They homeward then repair,
    In haste to join without delay
      The pic-nic or the fair.

    For times are not as they were wont
      To be in years gone by,
    When on the rural village green
      They reared the May-pole high;

    While gathered round a merry group
      Of youths and maidens gay,
    To crown some rosy rustic maid
      The smiling Queen of May.

THE FLOWERS OF THE FIELD.

Matt.  VI. 28.

    Behold the lilies of the field,
      In thousand colors drest;
    They toil not, neither do they spin,
      Yet God the flowers hath blest.

    Then toil not for the things of earth,
      But seek your God to please;
    For Solomon, in all his pride,
      Was not arrayed like these.

    Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass
      And flowers, that fade and die,
    Will he not much more care for you,
      And all your wants supply?

    Why will ye, O ye faithless ones,
      Distrust your Father’s care? 
    Are ye not better than the flowers? 
      Will he not hear your prayer?

    Your Father knoweth what ye need;
      Fear not, but watch and pray;
    And let your light shine more and more
      Unto the perfect day.

MY EARLY DAYS.

(See frontispiece.)

My father’s house was indeed a pleasant home; and father was the supreme guide of his own household.  He was gentle, but he could be firm and resolute when the case demanded.  Mother was the sunshine of our little garden of love; her talents and energy gave her influence; and united to a man like father, she was all that is lovable in the character of woman.

But the dear old home, where I grew from infancy to boyhood, and from boyhood to youth, I shall never forget.  It was a large house on the slope of a hill, just high enough to overlook several miles of our level country, and smooth enough with its soft grassy carpet for us to roll down from the summit to the foot of the hill.  At the back of the house was another hill, where we used to roll under the shade of the old elm, and where Miles and I would sit whole afternoons and fly the kite, each taking turns in holding the string.  This was a happy place for