340 State Horticultural Society. 



OUR BIRDS -LET US PROTECT THEM, THEY ARE OUR BEST FRIENDS. 



Think of your woods and orchards without birds! 



Of empty nests that cling to boughs and beams, 

 As in an idiot's brain remembered words 



Hang empty "mid the cobwebs of his dreams! 

 Will bleat of flocks or bellowing of herds 



Make up for the lost music, when your teams 

 .Drag home the stingy harvest, and no more 

 The feathered gleaners follow to your door? 



What! would you rather see the incessant stir 



Of insects in the windrows of the hay. 

 And hear the locust and the grasshopper 



Their melancholy hurdy-gurdies play? 

 Is this more pleasant to you than the whir 



Of meadow-lark, and her sweet roundelay, 

 Or twitter of little field-fares, as you take 



Your nooning in the shade of bush and brake? 



— Longfclloiv. 



I can not omit the bees from those who reciprocate with us. They 

 take the honey from onr flowers, btit the return a thousand-fold for the 

 honey taken, by fertilizing our fruits and giving us good fruits, sound 

 fruits, perfect fruits, and fruits in greater abundance. 



Listen then to the conclusion of the whole matter. If any people in 

 all the world should believe in reciprocity, preach it, practice it, teach it, 

 sing it, demand it, vote for it, pray for it, they are the fruit growers of 

 Kansas and Missouri. 



APPLE ORCHARDS. 



BREVITIES. 



"COLORADO BEN." 



Ben Davis was a handsome youth, but dry as any chip. 



For Nature gave him gnudy clothes, but let the flavor slip; 



And underneath his brilliant coat, he wore a pumpkin heart, 



A painted turnip, dry as bran, he went into the mart — 



\ hypocrite— a Pharisee— a fraud in royal guise. 



Without a single drop of juice — a liar of great size. 



And those who bit his bloodless flesh were prompt with gibe and curse. 



They came with solid chunks of prose— the poets threw their verse. 



Ben Davis heard their stinging words, they rankled in his mind, 



