Thus spake the boy so lonely,
The while his mother heard,
But on his prayer she pondered,
And spake to him no word.

That selfsame night she dreamed
A lovely dream of joy,

She thought she saw young Jesus
There, playing with her boy.

"And for the fruits and flowers Which thou hast brought to me, Rich blessings shall be given

A thousand fold to thee.

"For in the fields of heaven

Thou shalt roam with me at will,

And of bright fruits celestial

Shalt have, dear child, thy fill."

Thus tenderly and kindly

The fair child Jesus spoke, And, full of careful musings,

The anxious mother woke.

And thus it was accomplished,
In one short month and day,
That lovely boy, so gentle,
Upon his death-bed lay.

And thus he spake in dying :
"O mother dear, I see

The beautiful child Jesus
A coming down to me !

"And in his hand he beareth

Bright flowers as white as snow, And red and juicy strawberries, Dear mother, let me go!"

Her sorrow did restrain,

For she knew he was with Jesus,

And she asked him not again!

THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS.

THE melancholy days are come, the saddest of

the year,

Of wailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows brown and sear.

Heaped in the hollows of the grove, the withered leaves lie dead:

They rustle to the eddying gust, and to the rabbit's

tread.

The robin and the wren are flown, and from the

shrub the jay,

And from the wood-top calls the crow, through all the gloomy day.

Where are the flowers, the fair young flowers,

that lately sprung and stood,

In brighter light and softer airs, a beauteous sisterhood?

Alas! they all are in their graves, the gentle race of flowers

Are lying in their lowly beds, with the fair and good of ours.

The rain is falling where they lie; but the cold November rain

Calls not from out the gloomy earth the lovely ones again.

The windflower and the violet, they perished

long ago,

And the wild-rose and the orchis died amid the

summer glow;

But on the hill the golden-rod, and the aster in the wood,

And the yellow sunflower by the brook, in autumn beauty stood,

Till fell the frost from the clear, cold heaven, as

falls the plague on men,

And the brightness of their smile was gone from upland, glade, and glen.

And now, when comes the calm, mild day, as still such days will come,

To call the squirrel and the bee from out their winter home,

When the sound of dropping nuts is heard, though all the trees are still,

And twinkle in the smoky light the waters of the

rill,

The south wind searches for the flowers whose

fragrance late he bore,

And sighs to find them in the wood and by the

stream no more.

And then I think of one who in her youthful beauty died,

The fair, meek blossom that grew up and faded by my side:

In the cold, moist earth we laid her when the forest cast the leaf,

And we wept that one so lovely should have a life so brief;

Yet not unmeet it was that one, like that young friend of ours,

So gentle and so beautiful, should perish with the flowers.