Making evident our own creation,

In these stars of earth,-these golden flowers.

5. Everywhere about us are they glowing, Some like stars to tell us Spring is born; Others, their blue eyes with tears o'erflowing,

Stand, like Ruth, amid the golden corn:

6. Not alone in Spring's armorial bearing,

And in Summer's green emblazoned field, But in arms of brave old Autumn's wearing, In the centre of his brazen shield:

7. Not alone in meadows and green alleys, On the mountain-top, and by the brink Of sequestered pools in woodland valleys, Where the slaves of Nature stoop to drink:

8. Not alone in her vast dome of glory,
Not on graves of bird and beast alone,.
But in old cathedrals, high and hoary,
On the tombs of heroes carved in stone:

9. In the cottage of the rudest peasant; In ancestral homes, whose crumbling towers,

Speaking of the Past unto the Present,

Tell us of the ancient Games of Flowers:

10. In all places, then, and in all seasons, Flowers expand their light and soul-like wings,

Teaching us, by most persuasive reasons,
How akin they are to human things.

11. And with child-like credulous affection, We behold their tender buds expandEmblems of our own great resurrection, Emblems of the bright and better land.

WAR.

THOMAS CArlyle.

crafts, trades.
pur-port, meaning.

jux-ta-po-si-tion, opposite to each other.

1. What, speaking in quite unofficial language, is the net-purport and upshot of war? To my own knowledge, for example, there dwell and toil, in the British village of Dumdrudge, usually some five hundred souls. From these, by certain "Natural Enemies" of the French, there are chosen from time to time, during the French war, say thirty able-bodied men.

2. Dumdrudge, at her own expense, has reared and nursed them: she has, not without difficulty and sorrow, fed them up to manhood, and even trained them to crafts, so that one can weave, another build, another hammer, and the weakest can stand under thirty stone avoirdupois.

3. Nevertheless, among much weeping and

swearing, they are selected; all dressed in red; and shipped away, at the public charges, some two thousand miles, or say only to the south of Spain; and fed there till wanted.

4. And now to the same spot, in the south of Spain, are thirty similar French artisans, from a French Dumdrudge, in like manner wending: till at length, after infinite effort the two parties come into actual juxtaposi

tion; and Thirty stands fronting Thirty, each with a gun in his hand.

5. Straightway the word "Fire" is given: and they blow the souls out of one another; and in place of sixty brisk, useful craftsmen, the world has sixty dead carcasses, which it must bury, and anew shed tears for.

6. Had these men any quarrel? Busy as the Enemy is, not the smallest! They lived far enough apart; were the entirest strangers; nay, in so wide a Universe, there was even. unconsciously, by Commerce, some mutual helpfulness between them. How then? Simpleton, their Governors had fallen out; and instead of shooting one another, had the cunning to make these poor blockheads shoot.

THE

DRUM.

ar-id, dry; parched.

wold, open country; pastureland.

wrought, worked.

Che-vi-ot's hills, forming part

of the boundary between

England and Scotland. They are famous for a breed of sheep

he is in his home again, he dreams of home.

1. Yonder is a little drum, hanging on the

wall;

Dusty wreaths and tattered flags round about it fall.

A shepherd youth on Cheviot's hills watched the sheep whose skin

A cunning workman wrought, and gave the little drum its din.

2. Oh, pleasant are fair Cheviot's hills, with velvet verdure spread,

And pleasant 'tis among its heath to make your summer bed;

And sweet and clear are Cheviot's rills that trickle to its vales,

And balmily its tiny flowers breathe on the passing gales:

And thus hath felt the shepherd-boy whilst tending of his fold;

Nor thought there was, in all the world, a spot like Cheviot's wold.

3. And so it was for many a day;-but change with time will come;

And he (alas for him the day!)-he heard the little drum!

"Follow," said the drummer-boy, "would you live in story!

For he who strikes a foeman down wins a wreath of glory."

"Rub-a-dub!" and "Rub-a-dub!" the drummer beats away—

The shepherd lets his bleating flock o'er
Cheviot wildly stray!

4. On Egypt's arid wastes of sand the shepherd now is lying;

Around him many a parching tongue for "Water!" faintly crying:

Oh, that he were on Cheviot's hills, with velvet verdure spread,