THE SCARLET GERANIUM.

I WILL not sing the mossy rose,
The jasmine sweet, or lily fair,
The tints the rich carnation shows,

The stock's sweet scent that fills the air.

Full many a bard has sung their praise
In metres smooth, and polished line;
A simple flower and humbler lays
May best befit a pen like mine.

There is a small but lovely flower,

With crimson star and calyx brown, On pathway side, beneath the bower, By Nature's hand profusely strown.

Inquire you when this floweret springs ?When Nature wakes to mirth and love, When all her fragrance summer flings, When latest autumn chills the grove.

Like the sweet bird whose name it bears, 'Midst falling leaves and fading flowers, The passing traveller it cheers,

In shorten'd days and darksome hours.

And, should you ask me where it blows,
I answer, on the mountains bare,
High on the tufted rock it grows,
In lonely glens or meadows fair.

It blooms amidst those flowery dales Where winding Aire pursues its course. It smiles upon the craggy fells

That rise around its lofty source.

There are its rosy petals shown,

'Midst curious forms and mosses rare, Imbedded in the dark gray stone,

When not another flower is there.

Oh! emblem of that steadfast mind
Which, through the varying scenes of life,

By genuine piety refined,

Holds on its way 'midst noise and strife.

Though dark the impending tempest lower, The path of beauty it espies,

Calm 'midst the whirlwind and the shower, Thankful when brighter hours arise.

Oh! could our darken'd minds discern
In thy sweet form this lesson plain,

Could we it practically learn,

Herb Robert would not bloom in vain.

THE HELIOTROPE.

THERE is a flower, whose modest eye
Is turn'd with looks of light and love,
Who breathes her softest, sweetest sigh,
Whene'er the sun is bright above.

Let clouds obscure, or darkness veil,
Her fond idolatry is fled;

Her sighs no more their sweets exhale,
The loving eye is cold and dead.

Canst thou not trace a moral here, False flatterer of the prosperous hour

Let but an adverse cloud appear,

And thou art faithless as the flower.

ARMOUR OF THE ROSE.

YOUNG Love, rambling through the wood, Found me in my solitude,

Bright with dew and freshly blown,

And trembling to the Zephyr's sighs;

But as he stoop'd to gaze upon

The living gem with raptured eyes, It chanced a bee was busy there, Searching for its fragrant fare;

And, Cupid, stooping too, to sip,
The angry insect stung his lip:
And, gushing from the ambrosial cell,
One bright drop on my bosom fell.
Weeping, to his mother he
Told the tale of treachery,

And she her vengeful boy to please,
Strung his bow with captive bees,
But placed upon my slender stem

The poisoned sting she plucked from them:
And none since that eventful morn
Have found the flower without a thorn.

THE FORGET-ME-NOT.

NOT on the mountain's shelving side,
Nor in the cultivated ground,
Nor in the garden's painted pride,
The flower I seek is found.

Where Time on sorrow's page of gloom

Has fix'd its envious lot,

Or swept the record from the tomb,

It says, Forget-me-not.

And this is still the loveliest flower,

The fairest of the fair,

Of all that deck my lady's bower,

Or bind her floating hair.

FIELD LEAVES.

BY ELIZABETH OAK SMITH.

THE tender violets bent in smiles
To the elves that sported nigh,
Tossing the drops of fragrant dew
To scent the evening sky.

They kiss'd the rose in love and mirth,
And its petals fairer grew;

A shower of pearly dust they brought
And over the lily threw.

I saw one dainty creature crown
The tulip's painted cup,

And bless with one soft kiss the urn,
Then fold its petals up.

A finger rock'd the young bird's nest,
As high on a branch it hung,

While the gleaming night dew rattled down
Where the old dry leaf was flung.