We cannot make bargains for blisses,
Nor catch them like fishes in nets,

And sometimes the thing our life misses
Helps more than the thing which it gets.
For good lieth not in pursuing,

Nor gaining of great nor of small;
But just in the doing-and doing
As we would be done by, is all.

Through envy, through malice, through hating Against the world early and late,

No jot of our courage abating,

Our part is to work and to wait.
And slight is the sting of his trouble
Whose winnings are less than his worth;

For he who is honest is noble,

Whatever his fortunes or birth.

Alice Cary.

OUR OWN.

If I had known in the morning
How wearily all the day
The words unkind

Would trouble my mind

I said when you went away,
I had been more careful, darling,
Nor given you needless pain;
But we vex "our own"

With look and tone

We might never take back again.

For though in the quiet evening
You may give me the kiss of peace,
Yet it might be

That never for me

The pain of the heart should cease.
How many go forth in the morning
That never come home at night,
And hearts have broken

For harsh words spoken

That sorrow can ne'er set right.

We have careful thoughts for the stranger,
And smiles for the sometime guest,
But oft for "our own"

The bitter tone,

Though we love "our own" the best.
Ah! lips with the curve impatient,
Ah! brow with that look of scorn,
'Twere a cruel fate

Were the night too late

To undo the work of morn.

Margaret E. Sangster.

GRATITUDE TO GOD.

Notwithstanding all that I have suffered, notwithstanding all the pain and weariness and anxiety and sorrow that necessarily enter into life, and the inward errings that are worse than all, I would end my record with a devout thanksgiving to the great Author of my

being. For more and more am I unwilling to make my gratitude to Him what is commonly called "a thanksgiving for mercies," for any benefits or blessings that are peculiar to myself, or my friends, or indeed to any man. Instead of this, I would have it to be gratitude for all that belongs to my life and being,-for joy and sorrow, for health and sickness, for success and disappointment, for virtue and for temptation, for life and death; because I believe that all is meant for good. Orville Dewey.

LIFE'S SEESAW.

Gin ye find a heart that's weary,
And that needs a brither's hand,
Dinna thou turn from it, dearie;
Thou maun help thy fellowman.
Thou, too, hast a hidden heartache,
Sacred from all mortal ken,
And because of thine own grief's sake
Thou maun feel for ither men.

In this world o' seesaw, dearie,
Grief goes up and joy comes down,
Brows that catch the sunshine cheerie
May tomorrow wear a frown.
Bleak December, dull and dreary,
Follows on the heels of May.

Give thy trust unstinted, dearie,

Thou mayst need a friend some day.

A MOUNTAIN PASTORAL.

A couple at a cottage door,
Under the maple trees;

A mountain landscape stretched before,
Behind, beside; and nothing more
The passing traveler sees.

And is there more? The man and maid Who caught your idle glance

Love's pretty hide-and-seek had played Before they stood there in the shade, Reading their own romance.

And he is young and true and strong; And she is young and wise,

All hopes that to fresh hearts belong Around their humble doorstone throng; What more had Paradise?

Green are their waiting fields of toil,
With wildflowers blossoming sweet,
The living wealth no thief can spoil,
The boundless treasures of the soil,
Lie poured out at their feet.

Their neighbors? Not far off are they,
Beyond the bright home hill-
White Face, and Passaconaway,
And old Chocorua, rising gray,
Dreamy, remote, and still.

The future opens fair and wide
Within the young man's eyes;

The mountains bless the sweet girl-bride;
Life is a dream-land glorified.

What more was Paradise?

Lucy Larcom.

NIAGARA FALLS.

(This, the finest description of Niagara Falls ever written, is from a letter by Edwin Arnold to the London Telegraph, in 1900.)

Before my balcony, the great cataract is thundering, smoking, glittering with green and white rollers and rapids, hurling the waters of a whole continent in splendor and speed over the sharp ledges of the long, brown rock by which Erie, "the Broad" steps proudly down to Ontario, "the Beautiful."

The smaller but very imposing American Falls speaks with the louder voice of the two, because its coiling spirals of twisted and furious flood crash in full impulse of descent upon the talus of massive boulders heaped up at its foot.

The resounding impact of water on rocks, the clouds of water-smoke which rise high in air, and the river below churned into a whirling cream of eddy and surge and backwater, unite in a composite effect, at once magnificent and bewildering.

Far away, Niagara river is seen winding eagerly to its prodigious leap. You can discern the line of the first breakers, where the river feels the fatal draw of the