2 1 6 ARBOR DA Y MANUAL. 



A SERMON FROM A THORN-APPLE TREE. 



T WANT to tell 5 r ou about my thorn-apple tree. It came up by the gate, 

 X where it gets the drip from the watering-trough ; that's what made it grow 

 so strong and handsome. Every year it is just as full of blossoms as the apple 

 trees, and you know what it bears little red seedy berries, good for noth- 

 ing at all, so I used to think. But the first spring after I was sick, when I was 

 thinking how pretty it was -^ all blown out, and the green leaves peeping 

 through the white it just came to me that the thorn-apple was doing what it 

 was made for exactly, the same as the russet trees and the pippins ; and I took 

 notice, as I never did before, how the squirrels came to eat the seeds in the fall, 

 and h ow the blue-jays and the winter-birds seemed always to find something 

 there for a breakfast, and I came to love that thorn-apple and enjoy it more 

 than any thing else. It always seemed to have some lesson for me. I call it my 

 preacher, and whenever I look at it I think the Lord wants thorn-apples as well 

 as pippins. He sets a good many of His children to feeding birds and squirrels, 

 and doing little things that nobody takes any note of, and I'm thankful every 

 day that He lets me grow the blossoms, and feed His birds. Perhaps that is all 

 He may want of you, Ruby, but don't you be troubled about that. 'Abide in 

 Him,' as the branch abideth in the vine, and He'll see to the fruit. It will be 

 just the kind He wants you to bear." 



From EMILY HUXTINGTON MILLER'S " Thorn-Apph." 



THE TRAILING ARBUTUS. 



I WANDERED lonely where the pine trees macb 

 Against the bitter East their barricade, 

 And, guided by its sweet 

 Perfume, I found, within a narrow dell, 

 The trailing spring flower tinted like a shell 

 Amid dry leaves and mosses at my feet. 



From under dead boughs, for whose loss the pines 

 Moaned ceaseless overhead, the blossoming vines 



Lifted their glad surprise, 



While yet the bluebird smoothed in leafless trees 

 His feathers ruffled by the chill sea-breeze, 



And snow-drifts lingered under April skies. 



As, pausing, o'er the loneiy flower i cent, 



I thought of lives thus slowly, clogged and pent, 



Which yet find room 



Through care and cumber, coldness and decay, 

 To lend a sweetness to the ungenial day, 



And make the sad earth happier for their bloom. 



WHITTIER. 



