Have you any work to do
When you've finished growing?
Shall you teach your little buds
Pretty ways of blowing?

Do you ever go to sleep? -
Once I woke by night,

And looked out of the window,

And there you stood moon-white-
Moon-white, in a mist of darkness-
With never a word to say;
But you seemed to move a little,
And then I ran away.

White rose, do you love me?
I only wish you'd say.
I would work hard to please you
If I but knew the way.
I think you nearly perfect
In spite of all your scorns;
But, white rose, if I were you,

I would n't have those thorns.

Spell woodbines, purpose, scorns, perfect, weeds, surprise, finished.

eschscholtzia (esh sholt'zi a)

Every child knows the lupines of pink and

purple and yellow that stand or lie in the woods,

and also the pretty wild clovers that belong to

the pea family. This

family you can tell by its

butterfly-shaped flowers,

and nearly always by its seed-pods.

The Judas tree, whose rose-pink blossoms brighten

the hills before the green leaves of springtime come, and are followed by pretty purplish pods, is a plant of

the pea family. The Judas tree has a very bad reputation, but we are not altogether sure of the truth of the story that its nectar poisons bees and other insects.

The family to which

the snapdragons and fox-gloves of our gardens belong, has many wildwood relatives, all having blossoms with rims parted and curved.

Some of these wild blossoms with which you are no doubt familiar, are the bright red castilleia, or painter's brush, and the radiant pentstemon of the hills, sometimes scarlet, sometimes blue at the base and pink at the curved edge, but looking purple as it dances at every wind. Perhaps you know, too, the mimulus, or monkey flower, of orange, scarlet, buff, or salmon; one kind loving damp places, and another thriving best on dry, rocky hill-sides, but all of them apt to wither in your hands before you can get them home for your vases.

The shining yellow buttercup, the purple or blue larkspur, and the "gay red bugler" columbine, are another group of closely related flowers, all of them colored like bits of rainbow--all of them loved by children and praised by poets.

The shooting-star, with its fluttering pink or purple streamers, and sharp, black tip, is one of the earliest flowers of the California springtime, and is of the same family as the little weather prophet, the pimpernel.

The wild white forget-me-not, or popcorn flower, is a favorite from another family, although a delicate blue forget-me-not grows beside the maiden-hair ferns, right under the edges of the summer snow in the mountains.

But the joy and pride of every Californian is the brilliant, flame-colored poppy, the chosen State flower. Eschscholtzia, the botanists call it, but the early Spaniards gave it the much more beautiful name of Copo-de-oro, or cup of gold.

The abundance and brilliancy of the poppy in early days was so great, that fields of these gorgeous flowers seen on mountain-sides by passing ships, gave to certain regions of California the name of "Land of Fire."

The pretty little cream-cups belong to the poppy family, as does also the stately white Romneya, or Mission poppy, large as the magnolia, with gold threads of stamens in its satiny cup. The Romneya has been called the most splendid flower of the coast, and is now carefully planted in fine gardens all over the world.

Let us

Beautiful, indeed, are all our blossoms-whether of our home gardens or the wildwoods. not be of those "who trample a flower to the dust, without once thinking that they have one of the sweetest thoughts of God under their feet."

Definitions.-Eschscholtzia, name given to the poppy by the botanist who discovered it, in honor of his traveling companion, a Russian doctor named Eschscholtz.

Spell: insects, tramples, lupines, poisons, relatives, castilleia, radiant, salmon, mimulus, eschscholtzia, pentstemon.

How does the pea family shelter its seeds? Examine the seeds of the bur-clover. Of what use are the hooks? Of what use are the long, fuzzy, twisting handles of the alfilaria, or pin - clover? Write three names for the California State flower. From the flowers mentioned in this Lesson, make a list of those you know.

Read, if accessible, "Sermon of a Flower." - Henry Ward Beecher.

Copy and learn:

Along Ancona's hills the shimmering heat
Bathes all the fields of wheat until they glow.
The poppies, lithe and fleet,

Seem running, fiery torchmen, to and fro.
The farmer does not know

That they are there. He walks with heavy feet,
Counting the heads of autumn's gain.

But I-I smile to think that days remain
In which I shall be glad, remembering how the fleet,
Lithe poppies ran like torchmen with the wheat.

66

"You think I am dead,"

The apple tree said,

Because I have never a leaf to show-
Because I stoop

And my branches droop,

And the dull gray mosses over me grow!
But I'm all alive in trunk and shoot;
The buds of next May

I fold away—

But I pity the withered grass at my root."