DID you ever hear of the pitcher plant? At the end of many of its leaves are real pitchers, with lids, which are wide open in dry weather, when the pitchers are empty, but close tight when they are full. The birds come and lift up the lid, and help themselves when thirsty.

The "fly trap" is called so because if any fly lights on a leaf it closes in a moment, holding the poor fly prisoner till it dies. Strange to say, the plant seems to live on the dead flies, and droops if it gets none, or you do not give it little bits of raw meat instead!

if

The dancing plant moves its leaves up and down, or whirls them round, all the time, the one leaf rising as the other falls.

The sensitive plant won't let you touch it without shrinking away from you. If you just touch one leaf, the whole of the leaves begin to close and fold up.

Some kinds of creeping vines which I saw in Turkey squirted water at you if you touched them, making quite a crack as they did so.

orchard

18.-SPRING.

primroses

I AM coming, little maiden!

butterfly

With the pleasant sunshine laden;
With the honey for the bee;

With the blossom for the tree;
With the flower and with the leaf;
Till I come the time is brief.

I am coming, I am coming;
Hark, the little bee is humming;
See, the lark is soaring high,
In the bright and sunny sky;
And the gnats are on the wing.
Little maiden, now is Spring.

See the yellow catkins cover
All the slender willows over ;
And on mossy banks so green
Starlike primroses are seen;
Every little stream is bright;
All the orchard trees are white.

Hark, the little lambs are bleating;
And the cawing rooks are meeting
In the elms, a noisy crowd;
And all birds are singing loud;
And the first white butterfly
In the sun goes flitting by.

A MOTHER once told her children about the angels. I don't know whether she was quite sure of all she said; but her words were so pleasant, I'm certain you would like to hear them.

The angels, said she, my dear children, are as fair to look upon as the earth and sky in the light of spring. They have eyes bright and blue, and flowers that never wither in their golden hair, and their swift wings are like the silver moonbeams. By day and night the angels fly hither and thither in this glory.

Now let me tell you how lightly and softly the angels fly-as softly as the snow falls from heaven, as the moon glides round the world, as the bud breaks out of the earth, as softly as a leaf opens on a tree, as the cloud floats through the air, as the light passes over land and sea—so lightly and softly do the angels fly.

Now let me say, my dear children, what the angels do. Where a poor man prays in his need, they bring bread to his house; where a mother watches by a sick child, they take the child in their kind keeping; where a good man is in danger, when any one weeps, or is in fear, there the angels come.

Would you like to see the angels, my dear children? You cannot see them here, but if you fear God, and

live as your Bible tells you you ought, the angels will always be round you; and when your eyes open no more to the light of day, you will see them-they will wave their hands for you to follow them, and you must go where they will take you, for it will be to their own bright land. There, you yourselves will be angels.

A POOR little orphan, who had got a place as a nurse girl, was sitting weeping. The lady of the house, seeing her, asked why she was crying-what ailed her? "Ah!" said the child, "when I think what will become of me I cannot help crying! The other children go to school, and learn all that is good, but I grow up like a wild weed. I have no money to pay for the school, for I must work for my bread, and so I must grow up and know nothing. Then who will give me a place when I am a woman, when they can get girls that know so much? I would work all night, if I could only get sent to school by day, and learn the nice things they teach."

The lady was moved by such words, and thought, "I will have pity on this poor orphan. God tells us

to be kind to the poor, and to help any one to learn what is good is the greatest kindness we can do them.” So she sent her to school for some hours each day, and the child learned very fast, and the more she learned the more faithful she was, and the better she worked.

"Ah," thought the lady, "if only my children, when they grow big, would learn as well! Even though they will have money and friends, that will not make them happy or good if they have nothing more.”

WHEN icicles hang by the wall,

And Dick the shepherd blows his nail,

And Tom bears logs into the hall,

And milk comes frozen home in pail ;
When blood is nipt, and ways be foul,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
Tuwhoo!

Tuwhit! tuwhoo! a merry note,

While greasy Joan doth keel* the pot.

SHAKSPERE.

* In Ireland this word is still used for to skim.