re are some who think that no weed can be of interest
as a flower. But all flowers are weeds where they grow wild and in
abundance; and somewhere our rarest flowers are somebody's commonest.

And generally there is a disposition to undervalue common flowers.
There are few that will trouble themselves to examine minutely a
blossom that they have often seen and neglected; and yet if they would
question such flowers and commune with them, they would often be
surprised to find extreme beauty where it had long been overlooked.

It is not impertinent to offer flowers to a stranger. The poorest
child can proffer them to the richest. A hundred persons turned into a
meadow full of flowers would be drawn together in a transient
brotherhood.

It is affecting to see how serviceable flowers often are to the
necessities of the poor. If they bring their little floral gift to
you, it cannot but touch your heart to think that their grateful
affection longed to express itself as much as yours.

You have books, or gems, or services that you can render as you will.
The poor can give but little and can do but little. Were it not for
flowers, they would be shut out from those exquisite pleasures which
spring from such gifts. I never take one from a child, or from the
poor, without thanking God, in their behalf, for flowers.

CHARACTERISTIC OF HEROISM

The characteristic of heroism is its persistency. All men have
wandering impulses, fits and starts of generosity. But when you have
chosen your part, abide by it, and do not weakly try to reconcile
yourself with the world. The heroic cannot be the common, nor the
common the heroic.

_R. W. Emerson_.

LESSON XVIII

BEHAVIOR

There is always a best way of doing everything, if it be to open a
book. Manners are the happy ways of doing things. They form at last a
rich varnish, with which the routine of life is washed, and its details
adorned. Manners are very communicable; men catch them from each other.

The power of manners is incessant,--an element as unconcealable as
fire. The nobility cannot in any country be disguised, and no more in
a republic or a democracy than in a kingdom. No man can resist their
influence. There are certain manners which are learned in good
society, and if a person have them, he or she must be considered, and
is everywhere welcome, though without beauty, or wealth, or genius.
Give a boy address and accomplishments, and you give hi