The birds sang louder and louder to keep them and to call them back, but soon there was not a violet left in all the wood from end to end.

The snowdrops died, and the primrose faded, the cowslips and blue-bells vanished, the thorn grew white with blossom, the wild honeysuckle filled the wood with its fragrance, and soon the fruit began to ripen.

The blackbirds and the swallows and the chaffinches, and all the birds they knew, gathered round the garden trees and bushes, and forgot the woods, until suddenly one day they espied a little child. She was sitting on a chair under a tree; she had a little table before her and a pink ribbon round her hat; she was eating fruit with a large silver spoon. The birds were afraid, and held aloof until a sparrow chirped and the child looked up, and when they saw how blue her eyes were, they sang out bravely and fluttered round her, thinking that she had brought them news from the violets. But she never looked up again, though the birds crowded on to the branch above her, and perched upon the table, and rubbed their little beaks against her plate. She just held on her hat with one hand, and with the other went on taking up fruit with a silver spoon.

"Ah, dear child," a swallow twittered, "perhaps you do not know what is written in your eyes; so many of us carry secrets that we ourselves know last of all."

TOMMY'S STOCKINGS.

Two little maids went out one day, And really it was shocking!

They met poor Tommy on the way, With holes in either stocking.

They sat down on a low stone seat, And to and fro kept rocking, While they knitted, swift and neat, Each of them a stocking.

And sweet they sang a little song, The d.i.c.kie-birds kept mocking; And Tommy wished that all day long They'd sit and knit a stocking.

MIDSUMMER-NIGHT.

The children were very much puzzled what to do, for it was Midsummer-night, and they knew that there was a dream belonging to it; but how to come across it they could not tell. They knew that the dream had something to do with fairies, a queen, and all manner of lovely things; but that was all. At first they thought they would sit up with the doors and windows open, and the dog on the steps ready to bark if he saw anything unusual. Then they felt sure that they could not dream while they were wide-awake, so three of them went to bed, and one dozed in a corner of the porch, with her clothes on. Presently the dog barked, and two children in their night-gowns ran out to see, and one took off her night-cap and looked out of window; but it was only old Nurse coming back from a long gossip with the village blacksmith's wife and mother-in-law. So the dog looked foolish, and Nurse was angry, and put them all to bed without any more ado.

"Oh," they cried, "but the fairies, and the queen, and the flowers!

What shall we do to see them?"

"Go to sleep," said Nurse, "and the dream may come to you;--you can't go to a dream," she added, for you see she was just a peasant woman, and had never travelled far, or into any land but her own.

So the children shut their eyes tightly and went to sleep, and I think that they saw something, for their eyes were very bright next morning, and one of them whispered to me, softly, "The queen wore a wreath of flowers last night, dear mother, and, oh, she was very beautiful."

THE LITTLE MAID.

A little maid went to market, She went into the town, And all the things she had to buy She carefully wrote down.

The coffee, sugar, tea, and rice-- The currant cake for tea, And then she had to reckon up, And see how much they'd be.

She sat her down as she came back, She sat her down to see What they had cost--the currant cake, The coffee, and the tea.

She could not make her money right, And yet, how she did try!

She could not make her money right, And oh! how she did cry.

She's counting still, my dears, my dears, She's counting day and night, But though she counts for years and years, She'll never make it right.

She'll never make it right--right--right, Oh! never any more, Though she sits counting--count--count--count, Till she is ninety-four.

WAR.

"I don't like you," said he, in a rage.

"You are a naughty boy," said she, crossly.

"I shall never speak to you again."

"I shall never play with you any more."

"I don't care."

"And I don't care."

"I shall tell of you."

"All right. I shall tell of you."

"Nasty mean thing to threaten."

"You threatened first."

"Nasty, disagreeable thing."

"Ugly, unkind boy." Then they turned back to back, and stood sulking.

He put his hands into his pockets, and she sucked her finger.

"That's the worst of a girl," thought he; "I shan't give in."

"I can't bear boys," thought she; "and I won't make it up to-day."

"We might have had good fun all this afternoon if she hadn't been so silly," he thought presently.

"It would have been so nice if he hadn't been disagreeable," she thought after a bit. Then he began to fidget and to kick the floor a little with one foot, and she began to cry and to wipe her tears away very softly and quickly, so that he might not see them.

PEACE.

He looked over his shoulder quickly. She saw him, and turned still more quickly away. "I shall go and take a long walk in the woods," he said.

"You don't know where the rabbit-holes are," she answered.