Built of moss, and vines, and branches,
That had bloomed with many a flower,
Where they knew the little wanderer,
Weary with his pleading cry,
Lay among his flowers and mosses,
All alone, at last, to die.
And he brought the little token-
All that now remained of him-
Just one long and golden ringlet,

Twined about an oaken limb.

And they laid the golden ringlet,
With a new and sadder grief,
With the lilies, and the slipper,
And the tiny wheaten sheaf.

THOUGHTFUL MASTER TALBOT.

THE bell at the factory struck twelve. Down the stairways poured the operatives, the men walking away sedately, the boys dashing pell-mell, and the girls laughing and chatting in the cloak-room.

In the court below, a boy was mounted upon a push-cart. He was a hale little fellow of twelve years, with hair neatly combed, clean dress, bright eyes, and honest face. He was generally known in the factory as thoughtful Master Talbot.

"This way, boys and girls!" he cried, "this way! I have something to say to you." The crowd of young folks surged over to where he stood.

'Hello! Talbot," cried one, "have you turned street preacher?”

"Mr. Auctioneer," cried another boy, "when will the sale begin?"

"That's it! that's it!" echoed half a dozen voices.

"I move that a committee of five be appointed," said Aggie Burns, one of the older girls.

The motion was immediately seconded.

"Am I president of this meeting?" asked Master Talbot.

"In course you is," said Dick M'Allister. His grammar was bad, but his heart was in the right place.

"Question!" cried a little fellow, thrusting his hands far into his breeches' pockets. His call and attitude raised a loud laugh. The former, though parliamentary in form, was somewhat premature, while the latter was comical enough to laugh at.

Master Talbot put the motion, and it was carried unanimously, the little fellow aforesaid, in his excitement, voting "ay" repeatedly.

"Am I to appoint that committee?" asked Master Talbot.

where is your hat?"

"It is a strike, I'll bet," said still another.

Will you please listen to me?" said Master Talbot.

"Be quiet, boys!" cried a bevy of girls, reprovingly.

You all remember little Ella Parker, do n't you?" asked Master Talbot. "She used to tend the loom for lankey Joe Scroggins. Well, she is dead. She died at five o'clock this morning. She is to be buried day after to-morrow. She was a dear, sweet little thing. So trusting, so uncomplaining! Did n't we all like her? I propose that we attend her funeral in a body." How are we to get off?" asked one of the boys.

We

committee, together with Ruth Abbot. will proceed to the counting-room of Mr. Elliot at one o'clock, precisely. I would suggest that the committee be instructed, or allowed, to make all other arrangements that may be necessary to make."

"Just so, thoughtful Master Talbot," said Dick. "I'll do my sheer [share.] I'll stick to you all the time. Now 'journ the meetin', 'cause I'm mighty hungry."

At the hour appointed the committee entered the counting-room of Mr. Elliot. He was a portly, pleasant old man. He came forward, with his spectacles on his nose and his pen behind his ear, and shook hands with the whole five in turn.

"This seems to be a delegation. Is it a petition?" he asked, kindly.

"Y-e-s, s-i-r," said Dick. "A petition in boots."

"They are generally the most effective," said Mr. Elliot, smiling.

The widow sat in her room, with her hands folded in her lap, rocking to and fro, and moan

"Little Ella Parker is dead," said Master Talbot, respectfully, holding his hat in his hand; whereupon Dick, for the first time, remembered that his hat was on his head. "She is to be buried day after to-morrow, at nine o'clock. We have come to petition you to allow as many of us as may desire to attend the funeral, to do so."

in a plain shroud, of commonest muslin. Her golden ringlets were stowed away under the snowy cap, the lips were closed with a smile, and the long eyelashes swept, like a fringe of gold, the cheeks of marble whiteness.

The door opened, and the landlady entered. She was robust, red-faced, kind-hearted, very quick in her speech, and very slow in her movements.

What do you think, Mrs. Parker?" she commenced. "Did n't you offend me this morning by hinting about the trifle of rent that is due me, and so on; just as if it was in me to turn you out and fail you when you needed me most? And did n't I try to console you, tell

Mr. Harding," he said, "little Ella Parker died at daylight. She is to be buried on Thursday. Mr. Elliot has allowed us to attend the funeral. Mrs. Parker is very poor. She is not able to give her child a respectable burial. She has no relatives, no friends here."

"I suspect she has a friend in you, Master Talbot. I recollect having seen her several times. She is a frail woman, with bright eyes, and small, delicate hands. She moved to this place from the East about two years ago. What do you want me to do in the matter?"

"To start a subscription among the boss workmen."

"I will do it, Master Talbot. I would do it to please you, even if there was no other motive to prompt me. I will head the subscription with five dollars-or, get Mr. Elliot to start it with twenty-five."

pay me, and lend you a trifle of money besides, yet, for the matter of that—and that the good Lord would provide? Well, has n't he been here and done it?"

"Who? Done what?" asked the bewildered widow.

"Why, the Lord-or some one sent of the Lord! A man thrust this roll of bills into my hands at the door, and said it was for you. It is two hundred dollars, by count—and not a cent less!"

The widow was overpowered. She covered her face with her hands and wept.

"O Lord, I thank thee!" she murmured. The morning of the funeral came. The body was in the coffin. The landlady, a clergyman, and a few others were there. The widow thought of the old home, far away in the East, where she had friends in abundance, and sighed. Yet what did it matter, if but a few followed the beloved remains to the grave? Had not little Ella died triumphantly? Was she not already singing among the shining legions?

"O, Mrs. Parker, come and look!" cried the landlady, from the window. "O, it makes one's heart come up in their throat!"

The widow went to the window to look. Down the street came slowly, walking two by two, and cleanly clad, fifty boys and fifty girls, followed by as many men, with Mr. Harding

"I will do it now. I will waylay the workmen as they go out of the door. Where does the widow Parker live?"

At No. 48 Leonard-street, second floor." "By nine o'clock to-night I will call there with the money. You can take my word for that, and a creditable sum it shall be."

house and opened order. Eight little girls, all of one size, and dressed in white, came up through the center. They were the pallbearers.

I need not carry this sketch farther. Any little boy can understand what it teaches. Thoughtful Master Talbot was at the bottom of it all.

PLEASURABLE INDULGENCES.-Bishop Clark, in a recent sermon, uttered the following on the relation of amusements to piety: "The celebrated Dr. Blair, who preached the Gospel of Christ many years before he came into an experimental acquaintance with the renewing power of the grace of God upon the heart, going out one day into his field, where a deeply-pious farmer was at work, a man unlearned in the wisdom of this world, but deeply learned in the hidden mystery of God and Christ in the soul of the believer'John,' said he, what do you think is the hardest thing in religion?' 'Well, why, your reverence,' replied John, 'should you put this question to me, who am but an ignorant, unlearned man? Allow me to turn it back and to ask you the question.' 'Well,' said Dr. Blair, it seems to me that the hardest thing in religion is to give up those pleasurable indulgences that our nature is so prone to, but which are contrary to the requirements of religion.' 'Ah!' said John, 'your reverence, I think that there is a harder thing in religion than even this.' 'Well, what is it?' Said John:

It is to feel that we are wretched, and lost, and perishing, and to relinquish all other hope than that which rests in the atoning blood of the Redeemer.' Yes, at the very threshold this self-renunciation meets him who would enter the school of Christ. Though it may be difficult to give up these worldly and sensual indulgences to which our nature is prone, and which are contrary to the spirit of Christ and the religion of the Redeemer-if the heart is thoroughly renewed and regenerated, the very appetite, the very taste, the very passion for these indulgences is removed with this renewal of the heart. I remember, some years ago, in the city of New York, during a gracious revival of religion, there came among the other seekers of religion a young lady to the altar. She came night after night; she seemed deeply penitent; we talked with and prayed for her; we endeavored to remove the difficulties out of the way and point her to Christ; yet she came there night after night without obtaining peace. At last, one night, after, I think, she had been coming to the altar for six weeks, she said to me in an intense agony of feeling: 'Sir, do you think it is wrong to dance?' I found she had been passionately fond of that amusement, and her mind had been hesitating over it, questioning whether it would be contrary to religion in its spiritual character. I gave her such instructions as a Methodist minister ought to give. She made up her mind that even this indulgence, to which she had so long clung, should be given up. That moment God came down, and a more glorious transla tion I have never looked upon. 'Sir,' said she, 'I

have no desire to dance now.' I tell you, when the grace of God renovates the heart, these thirstings for worldly indulgences are quenched under the influence of the Spirit of God. And now, let me say to you, brethren and sisters in the Church, fathers and mothers in the Church, whenever you come to look upon these sinful amusements which are sweeping away tens of thousands of our young converts from the love of Christ; when you come to look lightly upon these indulgences afforded to your children, I charge you before God that you are already losing the tenderness and spirituality of soul you once possessed."

FEMALE ECONOMY.-He is a mean man who acouses a woman of meanness, because her expenditures are carefully regulated, and her outlay watched with close and unremitting economy. To be sure, no husband and father ever reproaches wife or daughter with undue care in circumscribing her expenses, but, whether consistently or not, all men-save our more just selves, perhaps charge the female character with containing a strong tendency to meanness and close-fistedness, qualities which no one tolerates in another than him. self or those who may spend for him. You may remember that no tradesman fears the exactions of any male purchaser so much as he does a woman. Nobody, it is said, higgles so long about the half cent per pound on the price of mackerel, or has so keen an eye for "remnants." They are charged with being bargain hunters, and are supposed to be a very set of dragons in their desire to save a penny.

Now, one word for the ladies. Who sharpened their mercantile wits? Who taught them, in a hard school, the lesson of economy, and obliged them, willing or not, to keep their expenditures down to the lowest limit? Who? Why, these same husbands and fathers. They-except in rare instances of female supremacyrule over the treasury, wear the clothes of authority, and control every appropriation. With a close fist they hand out little dribs of stamps, or, once in a while, a solitary, companionless, forlorn greenback, to the female members of their household. And they, driven by this stern necessity, obliged by higher authority to be economical, attempt to make fifty cents buy a dollar's worth.

Gentlemen of justice, pause and ponder. When your wife trades your second-best coat to the Jew peddler for a pair of parlor ornaments, or sells your files of valuable papers at so much per pound, inquire with the severity that inward examination ought to have, how much you have given her for spending money, this quarter. Upbraid her not for illiberality

if you forced her to it. Here we stand to plead her cause, and assert the reason, if not the propriety, of Female Economy.

A WORD TO HUSBANDS.-Has any body ever writ ten upon the responsibility which rests upon a husband with regard to the education of his wife? Of course we know what you will say about her being supposed to have "finished her education" before marriage, and all that; and yet you and we know that she begins as new an education with him as if she had never seen the alphabet. His views, feelings, his ideas, are they nothing to her, if she loves him? Years after, when they, who knew her as a girl," come to talk with her as a matron, do they not find her husband reflected in every sentence, either for good or evil? Of course, the more strongly a woman loves, the more completely is her own identity absorbed in her husband's. This is a point which is too much neglected by married men. A good husband is almost certain to have a good wife; and if she be "not so good as he could wish" at the commencement of their married life, he can soon educate her up to the proper mark. And, on the other hand, he can so educate her down as to render his house a purgatory, and, perhaps, bring upon himself and his family the greatest agony and keenest pangs of disgrace which a husband or children can feel.

THE CHILDREN-Not without design has God im planted in the parental breast that strong love of their children which is felt every-where. This lays deep and broad the foundation for the child's future education from parental hands. Nor without design has Christ commanded, "Feed my lambs"-meaning to inculcate upon his Church the duty of caring for the children of the Church and the world at the earliest possible period. Nor can parents and all well-wishers to hu manity be too earnest and careful to fulfill the promptings of their very nature and the command of Christ in this matter.

Influence is as quiet and imperceptible on the child's mind as the falling of snow-flakes on the meadow. One can not tell the hour when the human mind is not in the condition of receiving impressions from exterior moral forces. In innumerable instances, the most secret and unnoticed influences have been in operation for months and even years to break down the strongest barriers of the human heart, and work out its moral ruin, while yet the fondest parents and friends have been unaware of the working of such unseen agents of evil. Not all at once does any heart become utterly bad. The error is in this: that parents are not conscious how early the seeds of vice and virtuo are sown and take root. It is as the Gospel declares, While men slept, the enemy came and sowed tares, and went his way."

If this, then, is the error, how shall it be corrected, and what is the antidote to be applied? Why thusif we have "slept" over the early susceptibility of children's minds to the formation of character, we must wake up from our sleep, and acknowledge our error. And the antidote and remedy is simple and plain-we must preoccupy the soil; sow in the soil of these minds and hearts the seeds of knowledge and virtue, before the enemy shall sow there the tares of vice and crime.

This is the true doctrine of our duty to the children around our tables and in our streets.

Up, then, ye workers, and sow your seed in the morn of childhood. Withhold not the hand from early culture and honest toil. No labor here shall be in vain. Morning Star.

EDUCATION OF GIRLS.-The anthorities of Oxford University, England, are giving considerable attention to the subject of education as it relates to young ladies. It is contended that education as at present provided for females, leaves them nothing to build upon after they are supposed to have finished their education. A writer, speaking upon this very question, very forcibly

remarks:

"At present, as we take it, it is the want of a defi nite interest in some work or occupation of real moment which sets girls speculating about marriage at so early a period. It is not because she has a dread of being an old maid, or is longing to be 'settled in life,' or is discontented with her home, that the thoughts of a girl of eighteen or nineteen are so often turned to matrimonial contingencies. It is rather because she has no present object on which to expend her energies, and nothing to work upon with a view to any permanent benefit. With boys and young men it is the reverse. Life with them is very soon a reality, without any necessity for an early marriage. Men, as a rule, do not look forward to marrying till they are eight or ten years older than girls are when they seriously contemplate it. Their business or their profession, that profession being more or less the continuation of the work of education itself, furnishes them with an object for their thoughts and for the employment of their energies. But when the average girl has gone through the wretched 'course of studies' prescribed by the schoolmistress or the governess, all comes to an end, and the next thing is to be married, or, at any rate, to be engaged. Her education has totally failed to awaken ber interests in the subject of men's studies, and to culti vate her natural faculties to such an extent as to make their further cultivation and the acquisition of more knowledge a delight and a necessity."

A FAITHFUL MOTHER-A mother, whose children all bore the fruits of early piety, on being asked what the secret of her influence was, answered thus: "While my children were infants on my lap, as I washed them, I raised my heart to God that he would wash them in that blood which cleanseth from all sin. As I dressed them in the morning, I asked my Heavenly Father to clothe them with the robe of Christ's righteousness. As I provided them with food, I prayed that God would feed their souls with the bread of heaven, and give them to drink of the water of life. When I have prepared them for the house of God, I have pleaded that their bodies might be fit temples for the Holy Ghost to live in. When they left me for the week-day school, I followed their infant footsteps with prayer, that their path through life might be like that of the just, which shineth more and more unto the perfect day. And as I put them to bed, the silent breathing of my soul has been that their Heavenly Father would take them to his embrace, and fold them in his paternal arms."

WITTY AND WISE.

GOING TO LAW.-Two Dutchmen, who built and used in common a small bridge over a stream which ran through their farms, had a dispute concerning some repairs which it required, and one of them positively refused to bear any portion of the expense necessary to the purchase of a few planks. Finally the aggrieved party went to a neighboring lawyer, and, placing two five-dollar notes in his hand, said:

"I'll give you all dish monish if you'll make Hans do justice mit de pridge."

How much will it cost to repair it?" asked the honest lawyer.

"Not more as five tollar," replied the Dutchman.

"

"Very well," said the lawyer, pocketing one of the notes and giving him the other; "take this and go and get the bridge repaired; 'tis the best course you can take."

"Yaas," said the Dutchman, slowly, "yaas, dat ish more better as to quarrel mit Hans;" but as he went along home he shook his head frequently, as if unable, after all, to see quite clearly how he had gained any thing by going to law.

THE THEATER.-Dr. Rush told a friend that he was once in company with a lady, a professor of religion, who was speaking of the pleasure she anticipated at the theater in the evening.

What, madam!" said he, "do you go to the the

ater?

"Yes," was the reply; "and do n't you go, doctor?" "No, madam," said he; "I never go to such places." "Why, sir, do you not go? Do you think it sinful?" asked she.

He replied, "I will never publish to the world that I think Jesus Christ a bad master, and religion an unsatisfying portion, which I should do, if I went on the devil's ground in quest of happiness."

The argument was short, but conclusive. The lady determined not to go.

A KING'S BON MOT.-Lord Kenyon had a most ungovernable temper, which was not always restrained even in the presence of royalty. On one occasion he had fallen into a violent passion before King George III, and had spoken sharp and bitter words unseemly for a king to hear. The courtiers were expecting a pungent rebuke from the king, but he conveyed a more effective reproof by a witty bon mot. As soon as Lord Kenyon recovered himself he made a humble apology, saying he regretted he had lost his temper.

"You need n't regret it," was the prompt reply of the king: "I congratulate you on the loss, and hope you will find a better one."

Lord Kenyon was overwhelmed with shame, and the courtiers never allowed him to forget the joke at his expense.

JUST ONE WORD.-On entering home from the prayer meeting, one evening, in company with a little daughter of six Summers, the artless child, looking into my face, inquired, "Papa, what makes ministers tell naughty stories?" "What do you mean, my dear?" I inquired, with astonishment. "Why, papa," she re

plied, promptly, "the minister said that he was n't going to say but one word more, and then said lots of words. And," she continued, "Mr. S. said, when he got up to speak, that he was going to say only two or three words, and talked a long, long time, till I was so tired. Was n't that telling a lie, papa?"

VALUE OF AGE.-A negro named Ephe, who was a regular attendant at church, was proud of his Bible learning. He was sawing wood one day, while his master's son, a lad of twelve years, was looking on, and now and then asking questions.

"Which of the apostles do you like best?" asked Ephe.

"Well, I don't know," drawled the boy.

"I likes Samson," said Ephe; "he was so strong, and piled up dem wicked folks so."

Why, Ephe," replied the boy, "Samson was n't one of the apostles."

Ephe put down his saw, and looked at the boy a moment in amazement, and then asked him, with an air of triumph,

"Look 'ere, white boy, how old am you?" "Twelve," replied the boy.

"Well, I's forty; now who ought to know best? I ax you dat."

TAKE HOLD AND LIFT.-A teacher of the Freedmen, in one of the Southern States, was sitting at the window of her room, watching two negroes loading goods into a cart. One of them was disposed to shirk; the other stopped, and, looking sharply at the lazy one, said, "Sam, do you expect to go to heaven?" "Yes." "Then take hold and lift!"

There are a great many Christians in our Churches and Sabbath schools who expect to go to heaven, that would do well to strengthen their hope of going there by taking hold and lifting some of the burdens which they let their brethren bear alone.

AN UNINTENTIONAL JOKE.-A Rochester urchin unconsciously perpetrated a great joke at the expense of his teacher the other day. The lady was announcing to her pupils the holiday of February 22d, and asking them some questions concerning its observance; among others, why the birthday of Washington should be celebrated more than that of any one else. "Why," she added, "more than mine? You may tell me," she said to a little fellow eager to explain. "Because," he exclaimed, with great vivacity, "because he never told a lie!"

A NICE DISTINCTION.-"I fear," said a country curate to his flock, "when I explained to you in my last charity sermon that philanthropy was the love of our species, you must have understood me to say specie, which may account for the smallness of the collection. You will prove, I hope, by your present contribution, that you are no longer laboring under the same mistake."

AN APT SIMILE-A negro preacher, while holding forth to the colored soldiers at Port Hudson, said: "De whole of God's relation to us am like de wheel. De Lord am de hub, de Christians am de spokes, and de tire am de grace of God bindin' all togedder."