Long round his hearthstone may you bloom,
With smiles of love your father greet,
And fill your mother's vacant seat.




THE CULTIVATION OF FLOWERS.


Where can we find a more healthy and delightful employment, than the
cultivation of flowers? Though of less importance than those plants
which are necessary for the support of animal life, yet, rightly
considered, they yield a pleasant and instructive entertainment for the
intellectual powers, and may justly be termed food for the mind.

"Nonsense" some of our readers exclaim, "Nonsense, to talk of feeding
the immortal mind, with flowers! For one, I think people may find some
more useful employment than that of persuading their fellow beings to
spend the precious hours of this _short_ life upon these useless
playthings."

But pause, my readers, and consider who gave this finishing touch to the
face of nature. Who strewed the fields with flowers? Were they not
brought into existence by the same All-wise Being who created the earth
upon which we dwell, with its millions of intelligent beings, its vast
oceans, its towering mountains, its flaming volcanoes and its majestic
rivers with their awe inspiring cataracts; who created the sun, that
great fountain of light and heat, and the centre of attraction for those
vast globes which revolve around it, and then counterpoised with such