Ye innocent fair,

Of coxcombs beware,

To flattery never give ear:
Try well each pretence,

And keep to plain sense,

And then you have little to fear.

THE ANT AND THE CRICKET.

ANONYMOUS.

A SILLY young cricket, accustomed to sing

Through the warm, sunny months of gay summer and

spring,

Began to complain, when he found that at home
His cupboard was empty and winter was come.

Not a crumb to be found

On the snow-covered ground;
Not a flower could he see,

Not a leaf on a tree:

“Oh, what will become," says the cricket, "of me?"

At last by starvation and famine made bold,
All dripping with wet and all trembling with cold,

Away he set off to a miserly ant,

To see if, to keep him alive, he would grant

Him shelter from rain :

A mouthful of grain

He wished only to borrow,

He'd repay it to-morrow:

If not, he must die of starvation and sorrow.

Says the ant to the cricket, "I'm your servant and

friend,

But we ants never borrow, we ants never lend;

But tell me, dear sir, did you lay nothing by

When the weather was warm?" Said the cricket, "Not I.

My heart was so light

That I sang day and night,
For all nature looked gay."
"You sang, sir, you say?

Go then," said the ant, "and dance winter away."

Thus ending, he hastily lifted the wicket

And out of the door turned the poor little cricket.
Though this is a fable, the moral is good:

If you live without work, you must live without food.

A DISPUTE once arose between the Wind and the Sun which was the stronger of the two, and they agreed to put the point upon this issue: that whichever soonest made a traveller take off his cloak should be accounted the more powerful. The Wind began, and blew with all his might and main a blast, cold and fierce as a Thracian storm; but the stronger he blew the closer the traveller wrapped his cloak around him and the tighter he grasped it with his hands. Then broke out the Sun:

with his welcome beams he dispersed the vapor and the cold; the traveller felt the genial warmth, and as the sun shone brighter and brighter he sat down, overcome with the heat, and cast his cloak on the ground.

Thus the Sun was declared the conqueror, and it has ever been deemed that persuasion is better than force.

THE NIGHTINGALE AND THE GLOWWORM.

WILLIAM COWPER.

A NIGHTINGALE that all day long
Had cheered the village with his song,
Nor yet at eve his note suspended,
Nor yet when eventide was ended,
Began to feel, as well he might,
The keen demands of appetite;
When looking eagerly around,
He spied far off, upon the ground,
A something shining in the dark,
And knew the glowworm by his spark;
So, stooping down from hawthorn top,
He thought to put him in his crop.

The worm, aware of his intent,
Harangued him thus, right eloquent:
"Did you admire my lamp," quoth he,
"As much as I your minstrelsy,
You would abhor to do me wrong,
As much as I to spoil your song:

For 'twas the self-same Power Divine
Taught you to sing, and me to shine;
That you with music, I with light,
Might beautify and cheer the night."
The songster heard this short oration,
And warbling out his approbation,
Released him, as my story tells,
And found a supper somewhere else.

THE IDLE MAGNET.

TRANSLATED BY THE EDITORS. FROM THE GERMAN.

A BOY had a magnet. He wanted to keep it new and nice, so he put it into a chest away from all other iron. By and by he took it out to use. He held it to a piece of iron, but the magnet would not work any more because in its idleness it had lost all its strength.

A COUNTRY maid was walking along with a can of milk upon her head when she fell into the following train of reflections. "The money for which I shall sell this milk will enable me to increase my stock of eggs to three hundred. These eggs, allowing for what may prove addle and what may be destroyed by vermin will produce at least two hundred and fifty chickens.

The chickens will be fit to carry to market just at the time when poultry is always dear; so that by the new year I cannot fail of having money enough to purchase a new gown. Green-let me consider - yes, green becomes my complexion best, and green it shall be. In this dress I will go to the fair, where all the young fellows will strive to have me for a partner; but no I shall refuse every one of them, and with a disdainful toss turn from them." Transported with this idea she could not forbear acting with her head the thought that thus passed in her mind; when down came the can of milk! and all her imaginary happiness vanished in a

moment.

Do not count your chickens before they are hatched.

BAUCIS AND PHILEMON.

JONATHAN SWIFT.

IN ancient times, as story tells,

The saints would often leave their cells,
And stroll about, but hide their quality,
To try good people's hospitality.

It happened on a winter night,
As authors of the legend write,
Two brother hermits, saints by trade,
Taking their tour in masquerade,
Disguised in tattered habits went
To a small village down in Kent;
Where, in the stroller's canting strain,