Oh! how pretty!" cried the princess. "Do let me try!" But the first thing she

did was to pierce her hand, and down she fell in a deep sleep.

The old woman felt very sorry, but there was no help for it. She called the maids and pages and the king and queen. They carried the princess home, and put her in her own bed, and then sent for the good fairy.

When the good fairy came, she found them all in great sorrow, but she had thought of a fine plan. "I will put you all to sleep for a hundred years, too," she said; "then the princess will not be lonely when she wakes."

A hundred years went by, and a prince lost his way in a thick wood. He saw at last the towers of a castle and made his way to it as best he could. In the halls were the pages and the maids, all fast asleep. In his great chair sat the king, fast asleep too, with his beard grown down into his lap.

And in the room beyond was the lovely princess, looking so sweet and fair that the prince stooped and kissed her.

There was a sharp clash,

and everybody woke up.

The pages and the maids, the king and the queen

and the lovely princess

all opened their eyes as if they had slept but a little while; for to them it was as if the hundred years had never been.

WHO AM I?

Who am I, with noble face,
Shining in a clear blue space?
If to look at me you try,
Dazzled then will be your eye.

When my noble face I show
Over yonder mountain blue,
All the clouds away do ride
And the gloomy night beside.

Then the clear wet dews I dry,
With the look of my bright eye;
And the little birds awake,
Many a merry tune to make.

Then the busy people go,

To the fields their work to do.

And now, dear child, when yours

is done,

Guess if I am not the sun.

- ANN TAYLOR.

THE BOY AND THE BROOK.

One day a little boy who lived in the country was sent to town with a basket of butter and eggs to sell.

"Go straight to the

market," said his mother, "and do not stop on the road."

Yes, mother," said the lad; and he set off in high glee, for this was the first time that he had ever been sent to town alone.

By and by he came to a swift brook, and as he did not like to wet his feet, he sat down on the bank to wait for all the water to run out.

"It runs very fast," he said to himself, "and surely it will not take long."

So he sat there all day, and in the evening the brook was as full as ever. When he saw that the sun was down, and it was growing dark, he picked up his basket and ran back home.

"What does this mean?" said his mother.

"Why have you stayed so long? And why have you not sold your butter and eggs? Did I not tell you to go straight to the market and not stop on the road?"

"It was this way, mother," said the boy. "A swift brook was running across the road this morning, and so I waited all day for the water to pass by. But it is running there still."

"My dear child," said his mother, "you will be a very old man before all the water in the brook has passed by. If you wait for that, you will never sell your butter and eggs."

The boy is now a man, but the brook is as full of water as ever.

THE HUMBLE MAN.

He that is down needs fear no fall,
He that is low no pride;

He that is humble ever shall

Have God to be his guide.

-JOHN BUNYAN.