But e'en now the primroses,

Each one like a shining star, King-cups, like to flowers of gold Carved on drinking-cups of old, Were not-now they are.

Could the wealth of London town
Have been given three months ago,
To call these thousand wild-flowers forth,
And o'er the bosom of the earth
To cast this glorious show,

It had been vain: they were not then.
Look all around and see them now,-
In wood and waste, on hill and plain,
On the green bank of every lane,
On every hanging bough.

The wild flower waveth in the grass,

The blue-bell noddeth 'neath the trees,

The ancient leafy sycamore,

The older oak is quivering o'er,

With yellow racimes.

Look round! a brown and husked seed,

A berry, or a kernelled stone

A small and worthless thing to see-
Contains a flower, enfolds a tree,

And hence all these have grown.

Look round! the sunshine and the air,
The water-brooks that softly glide,
The mother-earth that keeps and warms,
Soft falling dews, careering storms,
Have nourishment supplied.

Oh gracious handiworks of God!

And thus is clothed the barren wild, With flowers so odorous and so fair, That spring so numerous everywhere, To please a little child.

Go, Florence, get me wild-flowers,
Go gather of the flowers thy fill,—
The blue-bell and the orchis red,
The boughs of wilding over-head,
The broom from off the hill.

For looking on a little flower,

A blessed truth shall reach thy heart,

A glimpse of that divinest plan

That bond of love 'twixt God and man

In which e'en thou hast part.

THE MISCHIEVOUS BOYS.

BY D. W. BELISLE.

An old man went trundling his barrow one day, Looking up to the windows and then on his

way

His clothes were in tatters, and dingy his hat, His shoes and his stockings were poor, and all that;

But still he went shouting and singing along"Any scissors to grind ?" was the theme of his

song.

His grotesque appearance excited the boys, And they all follow'd on with considerable noise

Up the streets, down the alleys, wherever he pass'd,

The lads gather'd round him more thick and

more fast

But the old man went singing along on his

way,

66 Any scissors or razors to sharpen to-day?"