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LET them sing of bright red gold;
Let them sing of silver fair;
Sing of all that's on the earth,

All that's in the air;
All that's in the sunny air,

All that's in the sea;
And I'll sing a song as rare

Of the apple-tree:
The gold-streaked apple-tree;
The red-cheeked apple-tree;
That's the tree for you and me,

The ripe, rosy apple-tree!

Learned men have learned books,

Which they ponder day and night; Easier leaves than theirs I read—

Blossoms pink and white, Blossom leaves all pink and white,

Wherein I can see
Charactered, as clear as light,

The old apple-tree:
The gold-cheeked apple-tree;
The red-streaked apple-tree;
All the fruit that groweth on

The ripe, rosy apple-tree!

Autumn comes, and our good man,

Soon as harvest-toil is o'er,
Speculates in apple-crops—

Be they less or more.
I could tell him; less or more

Is well known to me;
I have eyes that see the core

Of the apple-tree;
The old, mossy apple-tree;
The young, glossy apple-tree;
Scathed or sound, the country round,

I know every apple tree!

Winter comes, as winter will,

Bringing dark days, frost, and rime; But the apple is in vogue

At the Christmas time.
At the merry Christmas time

Folks are full of glee;
Then they bring out apples prime,

Of the primest tree; .
Then you the roast apple see,
While they toast the apple-tree,
Singing, with a jolly chime,

Of the brave old apple-tree!

AUNT," said a little girl, "I believe I have found a new key to unlock people's hearts and make them so willing."

"What is the key?" asked her aunt.

"It is only one little word. Guess what!"

But aunt was no guesser.

"It is please," said the child. "If I ask one of the great girls in school, 'Please show me my parsing lesson,' she says, ' Oh yes,' and helps me. If I ask Sarah,' Please

do this for me,' no matter, she will take her hands out of the suds and do it. If I ask uncle, 'Please} he says, 'Yes, Puss, if I can.' And tlien if I say, 'Please, aunt-'"

"What does aunt do?" said aunt herself.

"Oh, you look and smile just like mother, and that is best of all," cried the little girl, throwing her arms round her aunt's neck, with a tear in her eye.

Ill

THE Majors had but one child, Maggie, the heroine of the exploit that made so much stir in Warrenton. There had been four children in all, but this little daughter was the only one spared to them; and though she was a delicate little thing, never strong or well, she lived on, notwithstanding the mournful prediction that she would not live long.

Maggie always drove about in the carriage with her mother when she went on her charitable trips. Everybody was glad at the sight of the sunny little face, and everybody felt a certain sense of possession in the child, due not only to the love they felt for her, but for her father and mother aswelL

One evening in the early autumn, as Mr. and Mrs. Major sat together in the library, there was a great commotion in the kitchen, caused by the arrival of one of the "hands" from the Old Sachem Mill with news that the tenements standing near the works were on fire. Mary Ann Brady, the cook, rushed into the library to tell her master and mistress.

"Och hone! but me heart's broke intirely, an' me own sister an' her childer, not two months from the ould country, to be burned alive! Och hone! och hone!"

It was hard work trying to pacify her and find out the cause of her distress, as with her apron over her head she sobbed and moaned, rocking herself backwards and forwards; but as soon as they discovered that there was trouble in Mill Bank, as that part of the village was called, both Mr. and Mrs. Major hurried to do everything possible to help the poor labourers' families. All the servants went with them except the housekeeper, who remained at

home with little Maggie. The child had been in bed and asleep for two hours.

Mill Bank was a very splendid though very sorrowful sight. A number of the cheap wooden houses and barns erected for the workmen were in a blaze, the fire sending up great showers of sparks from the haymows and illuminating the sky with a lurid glow. The cries of the people increased the terror of the scene.

Mr. Major took the lead in the efforts they were making to control the fire, but before it was extinguished several of the houses were burnt to the ground. Mrs. Major with a baby on her arm, a little child holding one hand, and a third clinging to her dress, went as fast as she could to her own house to provide shelter for them and a few other children, whose mothers had been directed to bring them at once to the Major mansion.

"You've been gone a long time," the housekeeper remarked to Mrs. Major, as she helped her to bring the children up the steps. "I've been watching the fire from the sitting-room window; a grand sight, but it made my heart ache."

"And Maggie 2" Mrs. Major asked.

"Hasn't woke up once, with all the commotion. I've looked into the nursery three or four times and she was perfectly quiet."

But Mrs. Major wanted a look at the little girl herself. She went to the nursery, taking a lamp with her. But the bed was empty! The dint of Maggie's head was on the pillow, her clothes on the chair beside it, but no Maggie visible anywhere!

Mrs. Major hurried back to the housekeeper.

"Maggie is not in bed! Where can she be 1"

They went from one room to another in

pursuit of her, expecting at every step to meet the little figure, but they found no trace of her. The gardener, who had just come up from the fire, was called, and told to search the grounds. The coachman was sent back for Mr. Major. Mrs. Major herself, almost wild with excitement and fear, ranhitherand thither searching for the child.

The news of Maggie's disappearance spread rapidly. The fire had gone out, and the poor people forgot for a few minutes their own great calamity in their anxiety about Maggie Major. Their own little ones were safe and comfortable, thanks to Maggie's father and mother, and the uncertainty concerning her was a personal trouble to each one of them.

Exhausted though they were by their hours of hard work, all the men in Mill Bank joined in the search. Every foot of ground was traversed, far and wide. The river was explored, the woods were lit up with countless candles. They shouted themselves hoarse. The women turned out also. There could be no rest for any one in Warrenton till it was known what had become of Maggie.

The sky began to show faint tinges of pink. Day was coming, yet it brought no relief to the anxious hearts. No one was willing to acknowledge that the search had been useless, and they looked mutely and despairingly into each others' faces. Mr. Major returned by six o'clock. His wife met him silently—there was nothing to be said. He put his arms about her and kissed her forehead. Just then one of the little children whom Mrs. Major had brought home with her ran up to them.

"I told God Maggie had lost herself, and I just say he can find her if anybody can." Mrs. Major caught up the little one, kissing her over and over again. The kitchen was nearly full of people, all of them quiet,

crushed, subdued by the trouble which made them one family; the sorrow which had come as readily to the Major mansion as to Mill Bank.

"Why, papa!"

A sweet little voice spoke those two words. There, in the doorway leading from the kitchen to the dining-room beyond, stood Maggie, in her bare feet and nightdress, her flaxen hair floating over her shoulders, her blue eyes still misty with the sleep from which she had just awakened. She knew every person in the room, but her father was the first one she caught sight of. Mrs. Major with a quick exclamation seized the little figure in her arms. Surprise kept every one silent.

"I think I went to sleep in the droringroom, mamma," she said slowly, looking as much astonished as her hearers. "I woke up and hollered, and nobody heard me; and then I saw it all bright, and went in and sat on the big cushion in the gray window." She meant bay-window, but the words were intelligible enough.

"The fire was it, sure!" exclaimed Mary Ann Brady, never long silent; "an' to think the darlint was niver a bit afraid of the big blaze at all at all!"

They had looked in the drawing-room as well as in every other room in the house; but the dark blue table-cover which, as was afterwards found, Maggie, growing cold, had wrapped around her, effectually hid the white night-dress which might have revealed her. Besides, it was the most unlikely room for her to have entered, else they might have been more thorough in their search.

"The night Mill Bank was burned and Maggie Major was lost," became an era in the history of the town. No child in Warrenton ever tired of hearing the story of Maggie, or as her father often laughingly called her, "The Missing Major."