I've been grinding a grist in the mill hard by; I've been laughing at work while others sigh: Let those laugh who win!"

Sweet rain, soft rain, what are you doing? "I'm urging the corn to fill out its cells; I'm helping the lily to fashion its bells; I'm swelling the torrent and brimming the wells:

Is that worth pursuing?"

Redbreast, red breast, what have you done? "I've been watching the nest where my fledglings lie;

I've sung them to sleep with a lullaby;

By and by I shall teach them to fly,

Up and away, every one!"

Honey-bee, honey-bee, where are you

going?

"To fill my basket with precious pelf;
To toil for my neighbor as well as myself;
To find out the sweetest flower that grows,
Be it a thistle or be it a rose-

A secret worth the knowing!"

Wind and rain fulfilling His word!
Tell me, was ever a legend heard

Where the wind, commanded to blow, deferred ;

Or the rain, that was bidden to fall, demurred?

Be like the sun that pours its ray;
Be glad, and glorify the day;

Be like the moon that sheds its light
To bless and beautify the night;
Be like the stars that sparkle on,
Although the sun and moon are gone;
Be like the skies that steadfast are,
Though absent sun and moon and star.

A PAINTER OF POOR CHILDREN

THE

HERE is in England a stern-faced, quiet man who has faced death many times. He has been in mortal peril from fever, from poisoned arrows, from wild animals, and wilder men. He had promised to travel into the heart of the darkest continent in the world, and without fuss or parade he did what he had undertaken.

When he came home, much honor was shown him; he was knighted by the Queen and became Sir Henry M. Stanley. Then this fortunate man joined another great name to his own. He married Dorothy Tennant, a painter of rare power.

When this beautiful lady was a little girl, nothing interested her so much as "some dear little child in tatters." She begged to be taken where she might see poor children playing; she wanted to draw every one of them she saw, and her childish hand soon began to show great power.

She saw many sad things, and told them to the world through her pencil. One of her greatest pictures is that of a little boy looking with miserable, hungry eyes into a bakery window. Another is of a child violinist. In a wretched room, on the edge of a poor bed, he sits, holding in his arms his little sister. Love for his violin and for her are the only bright spots in the sad little picture.

But there is a happier side to the lives of the children of the streets. Many of their romps she pictures, - a band of ragged, merry children dancing gayly to the music of the hand-organ; a big boy wheeling a smaller one before him like a hand-cart, his legs forming the handles and his arms the wheels; two little girls looking admiringly at three boys turning somersaults. One boy whom she wanted to paint begged her to put him into her picture standing on his head, as that was the position he liked best to take!

Perhaps the beauty and success of her pictures may best be explained by her own words, "No ragamuffin is ever common or vulgar."

WISE SAYINGS

Never lose an opportunity to see any

thing beautiful.

Beauty is God's hand

writing. - CHARLES KINGSLEY.

What we must do let us love to do.

- COLERIDGE.

Two men look out through the same bars; One sees the mud and one the stars.