collected; needles, knife, and a small pocket-microscope for dissecting and examining them; a few quires of good drying paper, and a small press for preparing and preserving the specimens, is all the outlay that is really required.

As to material deserving of investigation, Nature furnishes that in the greatest abundance. I never found a wild flower yet which was not really and truly beautiful. It may have been drawn, its parts beautifully dissected out and figured, and even its minuter structure as revealed by the microscope shown, and yet to the thoughtful questions will arise as to the peculiarities of its organisation which cannot be answered satisfactorily in the present state of science. Every flower is therefore in reality a volume of which we may be said to have only read the title-page. In the eye of true science all plants are interesting, no matter how common. The study of botany is an attempt to answer the inquiry as to how Nature forms the green leaf and endlessly diversified colours of the flower. In every flower, however common, we have the problem yet unsolved as to how the warmth and light of the sunbeam forms from the lifeless inorganic elements of earth, air, and water, those new combinations of atoms which result in the slow, silent growth of the exquisitely symmetrical living forms of plants. This is in reality the object to be aimed at. Let the beginner never lose sight of it for one moment. All plants will thus become to him alike interesting as objects of scientific study. The beginner must not, therefore, think of confining himself to the investigation of rare and costly plants; on the contrary, let him seize upon the first weed or wild flower which he encounters, no matter how common or where found, and, taking the needle or knife, carefully separate the parts. On examining them with the microscope, he will soon find, even in the weed which he may have picked up, that the comparative familiarity which has induced contempt is wholly lost in the new interests which are awakened by its organic beauty.

Suppose we take the chickweed (Stellaria media, L.) as the subject of our first lesson. The seed of the chickweed germinates even when the temperature is a little above the freezing-point; hence this plant grows all the year round, and may be found sometimes even in the depth of winter, in flower, on sunny days, in sheltered situations. The great range of temperature which the chickweed bears without sustaining any injury accounts for its very greatly extended geographical diffusion. It is found throughout the United Kingdom and Europe and all over the United States and Canada. Dr. Hooker found the chickweed in India on the slopes of the Himalayas. Even in sub-tropical climates, where the orange-tree, the rice plant, and the palmetto grows, the chickweed finds a soil suitable for germination. A reference to my notes tells

me that on the 21st of January, 1867, I found the chickweed in flower in the streets of Savannah, Georgia, and in a botanical paper read before the Linnæan Society at Burlington House, I remember that the chickweed was on the list of plants mentioned as growing in the Holy Land along the shores of the Dead Sea.

These facts are well calculated to increase our interest in the chickweed. Although this little despised weed is without colour and fragrance, yet, as it belongs to the natural order Caryophyllaceœ, or the Pink family, it is allied to plants which possess both, such as the well-known carnation and the sweet-william (Dianthus barbatus), whose bright and attractive flowers have made it such a favourite in gardens. It is, therefore, at all events, most nobly related. But we have much more to say in favour of our little friend, whose growth we have watched for years with an ever-increasing interest. Let us see if we cannot give something like a good, substantial reason for calling it a beautifully formed plant, and we shall endeavour to do this briefly. A specimen is now on my table.

I notice in this plant features which it possesses in common with all flowering plants and certain peculiar traits of character. This indicates that, whilst it is subject to the same general laws of growth as the other plants, it follows its own peculiar law of evolution from the seed. Now there are three well-marked sets of leaves attached to the stem of all flowering plants. There are

1. The nursing leaves or seed-leaves. These always precede the other leaves; they are the first to be put forth and the first to fall. They contain nutritious matter on which the first pair of true aërial leaves subsists until fully grown, and the roots are developed into the soil. When the plant can grow without their aid they fall from the stem. All flowering plants have these nursing leaves. They are called by botanists cotyledons. They constitute the great bulk of the seed, and can only be seen when the seed begins to germinate, and the young plantule is separating from its folds. The nursing leaves are therefore not present on my specimen, which is a full-grown plant. The leaves attached to its stem are therefore the other two groups or—

2. The common green nutritive or vegetable leaves, which cause the plant to grow. By their united labours they build up the stem. These leaves are only expansions of the bark and fibre of the stem, with numerous porous openings both on their upper and under surface, by means of which nutritious gases are taken in from the atmosphere, whilst at the same time the roots are absorbing food from the soil-the two grand storehouses of vegetable nutrition. The leaves of this plant are ovate, smooth, on short hairy stalks, growing in pairs on either side of the stem. It is a curious and unaccountable fact that the hairs on the surface of the stem, which

is procumbent or rests on the ground, are not distributed over its surface, but are confined to single alternating lines between the leaves. The third group of leaves, which are far more highly organised, are

3. The reproductive leaves of the flower, by which the seed from which the plant originally germinated is again produced. The leaves make their appearance on the stem after the following fashion :-The ordinary green leaves of the stem become diminished gradually in size, the intervals of stem between them cease to form so that they finally crowd together into little terminal rosettes or clusters, undergoing a change both in form and colour, a flower is produced. All this is the result of the gradual expiration of growth in that direction. The plant has ceased to grow, and is about to reproduce. The outer leaves of the flower cluster in the chickweed are five in number, and form a little green cup, called botanically a calyx; immediately within the calyx we have another set of five leaves, smaller than the calyx, white and deeply cleft, called botanically a corolla. These leaves when spread out resemble a beautiful white star, which looks in early spring very pretty amongst the fresh, green herbage; hence the scientific name of the chickweed, Stellaria (Lat. stella, a star). These white leaves of the corolla are popularly known as the flower or blossom.

But the parts within these white petals or leaves are now so minute that it becomes necessary to use the lens and dissecting knife in order to get at them. If I were at your elbow, reader, I could make you understand. You will find drawings of these parts in almost any botanical work. We call them stamens and pistils. They are so small and unattractive that they usually escape vulgar observation, and yet they are the most important leaves of the flower, all the others being subservient to their growth and maturity. The stamens and pistils are the last and most highly organised leaves put forth by the plant. These are leaves which co-operate most directly in the formation of the seed, which contains within its folds the embryo, or infant plant. The stamens form fertilising matter, called pollen, which the pistils receive; the latter are always the most centrally situated organs of the flower, whilst the former immediately surround them. The pollen shed on the pistils having communicated its influence to the ovules, or little unimpregnated seeds in the ovary of the pistils, they become fertilised, and form the future seed, from which the plant, under favourable circumstances, will again grow.

We have thus a complete cycle of life-changes, ever revolving upon itself, of the most deeply interesting nature. There is something so beautifully regular in this succession of leaves, each doing the work which Providence has assigned them in the building up of the plant form, so chemically, anatomically, and physiologically

wonderful in their metamorphosis or changes of form and colouring, and they advance step by step to a higher type of organisation; and then that curious fertilising action which takes place amongst them when they crowd together and form flowers, by means of which the seed from which the plant originally germinated is again produced. Will it be believed that this brief and imperfect sketch of the life-history of a chickweed is an outline of the life of all flowers whose leaves are all subjected to the same laws of metamorphosis, and have the same life-duties to perform? Here, then, we have a plan which is simplicity itself, and at the same time the most ample material for study; for look at the infinite variety of nature, the countless hosts of flowers with which the earth's surface has been beautified.

A REQUIEM.

WHAT bard can sing a fitting requiem
For the unnumbered brave

Pity nor love could save;

Who, in the bonds of Death's fraternity,
Share their rude burial with the enemy,
And Glory's ills no more disquiet them?
Let the soft night-dews fall upon the slain.
There are no tears so pure,

And sorrow could secure

No tenderer mourning for the hallowed dead.
Fall, and wash out the stains where heroes bled,
As tears erase the memory of pain.

Let the bright sunbeams cleave the clouded skies,
And root some simple flowers

That shall in future hours

Be treasured for the memories they will bring
Of the fair manhood, erst a living thing,-
Now the cold ashes of a sacrifice.

And let the little birds at break of day
Pour unsolicited

Their music o'er the dead.

The ulla-lullas we essay to sing

Falter and perish in the uttering ;

An empty nest would mar the sweetest lay.

Let the Great Spirit, symbol'd as a dove,
The promised Comforter,

Descend to minister

To hearts that wait for unreturning feet,

That count the hours by their own feverish beat-
Strung to the strained expectancy of love.

Let the wild wind sweep by with plaintive moan,
And lift the people's prayer,
Broken by its despair,

Unto His ear who maketh wars to cease,

Who, throned in light, reigneth the Prince of Peace,
Earth being but the footstool of His throne.

MERNER MANTON.

The Children's Hour.

BAYARD

KNIGHT'S AMBITION.

BY MARIANNE FARNINGHAM.

CHAPTER V.-A SHADOW.

I CANNOT tell you all that happened to Bayard during the next year, which was, as you will remember, the second of the twenty which he allowed himself in which to accomplish the work on which he had set his heart. But as it formed, as he himself said, "the second step of the ladder," I should like to tell you a little about it.

The first three months were busy ones. Bayard found that there was plenty to learn in the shop, and he gave himself diligently to it. He was, as you already know, a conscientious boy, and that made him honest in every respect. He had to work very hard, and I will not say that he was never tempted to do as the apprentices advised him, "take it easy." But his conscientiousness as well as his activity prevented that.

My time is my master's, and if I waste it it is a kind of dishonesty."

This is the way in which Bayard looked at the matter, and I wish all who are employed by others saw it in the same light.

His master perceived that Bayard did his duty, that he was always diligent and upright, whether he was watched or left to himself. Perhaps he guessed that he had read over thoughtfully the verses which all lads starting in life should remember :

:

"Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in singleness of your heart, as unto Christ; not with eyeservice as men pleasers; but as the servants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart; with good will doing service, as to the Lord, and not to men."

Any one making this the rule of his conduct, is certain to win. the favour of those who are over him. And Bayard was trusted by his master.