ce;
All unlike our ducklet feathers,--
White and soft, but cold as ice.

{309}

Yet they cover, warmly cover
Mother Earth so bleak and brown;
Cover her with feathery mantles,
Comforters of eider-down.

{310}

_FOREST TREES._

Children, have you seen the budding
Of the trees in valleys low?
Have you watched it creeping, creeping
Up the mountain, soft and slow?
Weaving there a plush-like mantle,
Brownish, grayish, red-dish green,
Changing, changing, daily, hourly,
Till it smiles in emerald sheen?

Have you watched the shades so varied,
From the graceful, little white birch,
Faint and tender, to the balsam's
Evergreen, so dark and rich?
Have you seen the quaint mosaics
Gracing all the mountain-sides,
Where they, mingling, intertwining,
Sway like softest mid-air tides?

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Have you seen the autumn frostings
Spread on all the leafage bright,
Frostings of the rarest colors,
Red and yellow, dark and light?
Have you seen the glory painted
On the mountain, valley, hill,
When the landscape all illumined,
Blazons forth His taste and skill?

Have you seen the foliage dropping,
Tender cling, as loth to leave
Mother-trees that taught them deftly,
All their warp and woof to weave?
Have you seen the leafless branches
Tossing wildly 'gainst the blue?
Have you seen the soft gray beauty
Of their wintry garments' hue?

Have you thought the resurrection
Seen in Nature year by year,
Is a symbol of our rising
In a higher, holier sphere?
Children, ye are buds maturing;
Make your autumn rich and grand,
That your winter be a passage
Through the gates to Glory-land.

{312}

_CHILDHOOD FANCIES._

The twilight gray is falling,
Now list and you shall hear
The footsteps of the sylphid fays,--
This is their hour of cheer.

List to the gentle patter
On each wee blade of grass,
As it is bent, and back again,
Whene'er the fairies pass.

{313}

Upon the tips of grasses
They cross the meadows, lawn,
And laugh and dance and play and sing,
From twilight hour till dawn.

They light their myriad lanterns,
And hang them in the arch
Of blue that canopies o'erhead,
And by their light they march.

They sometimes miss a fairy,
And take a lantern down
To search for her, and mortals say;
"A fire-fly flit