The Work Of Nature In The Months.

Now sweet , now sad , are the p ictures the Yiolet conjures up" Even noAV , what affections the violet awakes ! ' ' says Campbell ; Avhilst Sir Edward Buhver Ly tton , in his " Corn Plowers , " asks : — ' ' Who that has loved knows not the tender tale Which flowers revealwhen lips are coy to tell ?

, Whose youth has passed not , dreaming in the vale Where the rathe Violets dAvell ? ******** Brief-lived first flowers—first love ? the hours steal on To prank the world in summer ' s pomp of hue , But Avhat can flaunt beneath a fiercer sun Worth Avhat we lose in you ?

Oft by a floiver , a leaf , in some loved book We mark the lines that charm us most ;—retrace Thy life—recall its loveliest passage;—look , Dead Violets keep the place !" To Eliza Cook ' s Avarin heart they told another story : — " 'Twas on a day in early spring . Before the butterfly took wing ;

******* A tiny boy with pallid face , Stood in the city ' s thickest place ; His limbs were lank as limbs could be , His tattered garments sad to see ; A basket on his arm he bore , Which gave to sight a little store Of Violets in bunches spread ,

Fresh gathered from their native bed . Their perfume scarcely lived at all , Their purple heads were very small , Their leaves were pinched and shrivelled in , Their stalks were turning dry and thin . 'Twas very , very cold spring weather , And Boy and FloAvers seemed starved together . " Need we say that she goes on to read us the same lesson that Bulwer does fro m a > companion

flower?" Avarice , remember Avhen the Cowslip ' s gold Lured and yet lost its glitter in thy grasp . Do thy hoards glad thee more than those of old ? Those Avither'd in thy clasp . From these thy clasp falls palsied . —It was then That thou wert rich—thy coffers are a lie ; Alas ! poor foolJoy is the wealth of men ,

, And Care their penury . " At least , we shall find it so in the great clay of the Master ' s reckoning Avith His stewards , Avhen we shall Avistfully strain after these words of condemnation of His : — " Inasmuch as ye did unto one of the least of these , ye did it unto Me !" This raising up of the lowly and apparently insignificant bids us look loAver , as perhaps consider it , in Nature ' s kingdom , in order that AVO may take note of the Great find

Artificer ' s hand being over all His Avorks , small as Avell as great . Doing this , ; that whilst the beautiful aud sweet-scented p lants are putting forth their flowers , evcu , the humble grasses are coming into bloom . On earth-topped walls , thin-soiled rocks , ; and even on thatch , the little white-flowered Whitlow-grass is everywhere abundant . The broad-leaved Wood-rush , with its hair-covered leaves , in copses ; and the H ave tail Cotton-grass , Avhich in summer time adorns the wild moorland Avith its balk o ' woolly down , are also now in blossom . As AVC have said , these may escape the eye of th