TO THE HUMBLE BEE.

GOOD-MORROW, gentle humble bee:
You are abroad betimes, I see,
And sportive fly from tree to tree,

To take the air ;
And visit each gay flower that blows;
While ev'ry bell and bud that glows,
Quite from the daisy to the rose,

Your visits share.

Saluting now the pied Carnation,
Now on the Aster taking station,
Murmuring your ardent admiration,
Then off

you

frisk Where Poppies hang their heavy heads, Or where the gorgeous Sun-flower spreads For you

her luscious golden beds, On her broad disk.

To live on pleasure's painted wing,
To feed on all the sweets of spring,
Must be a mighty pleasant thing,

If it would last :
But you, no doubt, have wisely thought
These joys may be too dearly bought,
And will not unprepared be caught,

When summer's past.

For soon will fly the laughing hours,
And this delightful waste of flowers
Will shrink before the wintry showers,

And winds so keen.
Alas! who then will lend you aid,
If

your dry cell be yet unmade, Nor store of wax and honey laid

In magazine ?

Then, Lady Buzz, you will repent,
That hours for useful labour meant
Were so unprofitably spent,

And idly lost.
By cold and hunger keen opprest,
Say, will your yellow velvet breast
Shield

you

from frost ?

Ah! haste your winter stock to save,
That
snug
within

your

Christmas cave,
When snows fall fast and tempests rave,

You may remain :
And the hard season braving there,
On spring's warm gales you will repair,
*Elate through crystal fields of air
To bliss again.

MRS. C. SMITH.

THE VISIBLE CREATION.

THE God of nature and of grace

In all his works appears ;
His goodness through the earth we trace,

His grandeur in the spheres.

Behold this fair and fertile globe,

By Him in wisdom plann'd ; 'Twas He who girded, like a robe,

The ocean round the land.

Lift to the firmament your eye,

Thither his path pursue ;
His glory, boundless as the sky,

O’erwhelms the wondering view.

He bows the heavens the mountains stand

A highway for their God;
He walks amidst the desert land,

'Tis Eden where He trod.

The forests in his strength rejoice;

Hark! on the evening breeze,
As once of old, the Lord God's voice

Is heard among the trees.

Here on the hills He feeds his herds,

His flocks on yonder plains :
His praise is warbled by the birds ;

O could we catch their strains !

Mount with the lark, and bear our song

Up to the gates of light,
Or with the nightingale prolong

Our numbers through the night!

In every stream his bounty flows,

Diffusing joy and wealth ;
In every breeze his spirit blows,

The breath of life and health.

His blessings fall in plenteous showers

Upon the lap of earth,
That teems with foliage, fruit, and flowers,

And rings with infant mirth.

If God hath made this world so fair,

Where sin and death abound,
How beautiful beyond compare
Will Paradise be found !

J. MONTGOMERY.

1

TO A WATERFOWL.

WHITHER, ʼmidst falling dew, While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue

Thy solitary way?

Vainly the fowler's eye
Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As, darkly painted on the crimson sky,

Thy figure floats along.

Seek'st thou the plashy brink
Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,
Or where the rocking billows rise and sink

On the chaf'd ocean side ?

There is a Power whose care
Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,-
The desert and illimitable air,-

Lone wandering, but not lost.

All day thy wings have fann'd,
At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere,
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,

Though the dark night is near.

And soon that toil shall end ; Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest, And scream among thy fellows ; reeds shall bend,

Soon, o'er thy shelter'd nest.

Thou’rt gone, the abyss of heaven
Hath swallow'd up thy form ; yet, on my heart
Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given,

And shall not soon depart.

He who from zone to zone, Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, In the long way that I must tread alone, Will lead my steps aright.

BRYANT.

THE LILIES OF THE FIELD.

Lo, the lilies of the field,
How their leaves instruction yield;
Hark to nature's lesson given
By the blessed birds of heaven!
Every bush and tufted tree
Warbles sweet philosophy;
“ Mortal, fly from doubt and sorrow;
God provideth for the morrow.

Say, with richer crimson glows
The kingly mantle than the rose ?
Say, have kings more wholesome fare
Than we poor citizens of air ?
Barns nor hoarded grain have we,
Yet we carol merrily.
Mortal, fly from doubt and sorrow ;
God provideth for the morrow.

“ One there lives, whose guardian eye
Guides our humble destiny;
One there lives, who, Lord of all,
Keeps our feathers lest they fall :
Pass we blithely then the time,
Fearless of the snare and lime,
Free from doubt and faithless sorrow :
God provideth for the morrow.”

HEBER.