g and weary the way was, to his limping feet! But at last he
reached home, just at milking time; and when the milkmaid saw him
standing at the gate, she gave a scream that brought the household out.

Dick and the cook and Fleet tumbled over each other in their surprise,
and the barnyard was in such an excitement that one hen lost her
chickens and did not find them all for fifteen minutes.

"What did you see?" cried the brindle calf.

"What made you come back?" asked the geese; but Dick and Friend Fleet
asked no questions, because they understood.

That was a long time ago, and the brown colt is a strong horse now, and
Dick a tall boy; but neither of them will ever forget the day when Dick
was careless and did not shut the farmyard gate.

_INSIDE THE GARDEN GATE_

MOTTO FOR THE MOTHER

_Wisdom comes with all we see,
God writes His lessons in each flower,
And ev'ry singing bird or bee
Can teach us something of His power_.

PART I.

Grandmother's garden was a beautiful place,--more beautiful than all the
shop windows in the city; for there was a flower or grass for every
color in the rainbow, with great white lilies, standing up so straight
and tall, to remind you that a whole rainbow of light was needed to make
them so pure and white.

There were pinks and marigolds and princes' feathers, with bachelor's
buttons and Johnny-jump-ups to keep them company. There were gay poppies
and gaudy tulips, and large important peonies and fine Duchess roses in
pink satin dresses.

There were soft velvet pansies and tall blue flags, and broad
ribbon-grasses that the fairies might have used for sashes; and mint and
thyme and balm and rosemary everywhere, to make the garden sweet; so it
was no wonder that every year, the garden was full of visitors.

Nobody noticed these visitors but Grandmother and Lindsay.

Lindsay was a very small boy, and Grandmother was a very old lady; but
they loved the same things, and always watched for these little
visitors, who came in the early spring-time and stayed all summer with
Grandmother.

Early, early in the spring, when the garden was bursting into bloom in
the warm southern sunshine, Grandmother and Lindsay would sit in the
arbor, where the vines crept over and over in a tangle of bloom, and
listen to a serenade. Music, music everywhere! Over their heads, behind
their backs, the little brown bees would fly, singing their song:--

"_Hum, hum, hum!