974 



Rural School Leaflet. 



I watcli the snowflakes as they fall 

 On bank and briar and broken wall ; 

 Over the orchard, waste and brown, 

 All noiselessly they settle down, 

 Tipping the apple-boughs, and each 

 Light quivering twig of plum and peach 



The ragged bramble, dwarfed and old, 

 Shrinks like a beggar in the cold; 

 In surplice white the cedar stands, 

 And blesses him with priestly hands. 



— /. T. Trowbridge 



' What cheer is there that is half so good, 

 In the snowy waste of a winter night. 



As a dancing fire of hickory wood. 

 And an easy chair in its mellow light. 



And a Pearmain apple, ruddy and sleek, 

 Or a Janelting with a freckled cheek?" 



Close by the jolly fire I sit 

 To warm my frozen bones a bit. 



• — Robert Louis Stevenson 



" Oh, every year hath its winter, 

 And every year hath its rain — 

 But a day is always coming 



When the birds go North again." 



