its fruit by cottage-hearth,
And guests in prouder homes shall see,
Heaped with the grape of Cintra's vine,
And golden orange of the line,
The fruit of the apple-tree.

The fruitage of this apple-tree,
Winds and our flag of stripe and star
Shall bear to coasts that lie afar,
Where men shall wonder at the view,
And ask in what fair groves they grew;
And sojourners beyond the sea
Shall think of childhood's careless day,
And long, long hours of summer play,
In the shade of the apple-tree.

[Illustration]

Each year shall give this apple-tree
A broader flush of roseate bloom,
A deeper maze of verdurous gloom,
And loosen, when the frost-clouds lower,
The crisp brown leaves in thicker shower.
The years shall come and pass, but we
Shall hear no longer, where we lie,
The summer's songs, the autumn's sigh,
In the boughs of the apple-tree.

And time shall waste this apple-tree.
Oh, when its aged branches throw
Thin shadows on the ground below,
Shall fraud and force and iron will
Oppress the weak and helpless still?
What shall the tasks of mercy be,
Amid the toils, the strifes, the tears
Of those who live when length of years
Is wasting this little apple-tree?

"Who planted this old apple-tree?"
The children of that distant day
Thus to some aged man shall say;
And, gazing on its mossy stem,
The gray-haired man shall answer them:
"A poet of the land was he,
Born in the rude but good old times;
'Tis said he made some quaint old rhymes
On planting the apple-tree."

[Illustration]

=April Fools' Day=

_April 1_

So old is the custom of playing amiable and harmless tricks upon the
first of April that its origin is not definitely known. It is not a
holiday and not worthy to be one, but it should be good for our sense of
humor and that is one of the best things we can have. An April fool is
sometimes called a "Fourth-month Dunce."

=FOURTH-MONTH DUNCE=

BY H.M.M.

The curious custom of joking on the first of April, sending the ignorant
or the unwary on fruitless errands, for the sake of making them feel
foolish and having a laugh at them, prevails very widely in the world.
And whether you call the victim a "Fourth-month Dunce," an "April fool,"
an "April fish" (as in France), or an "April gowk"