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ARBOR DA Y MANUAL. 
BITS OF THINGS. 
T HE oak-tree boughs once touched the grass; 
But every year they grew 
A little farther from the ground, 
And nearer to the blue. 
So live that you each year may be, 
While time glides swiftly by, 
A little farther from the earth, 
And nearer to the sky. 
Flowers are Love’s truest language ; they betray, 
Like the divining rods of Magi old, 
Where precious wealth lies buried, not of gold, 
But love— strong love, that never can decay ! 
Park Benjamin - . 
Immortal amaranth, a flower which once 
In Paradise, fast by the tree of life, 
Began to bloom; but soon for Man's offense, ’ 
To heav’n removed, where first it grew, there grows, 
And flow’rs aloft shading the fount of life. 
Milton. 
Most worthy of the oaken wreath 
The ancients him esteemed, 
Who, in a battle had from death 
Some man of worth redeemed. 
Drayton. 
“Planting and pruning trees,” Sir Walter said, “ I could work at from morn¬ 
ing till night. There is a sort of self-congratulation, a little tickling self- 
flattery in the idea that while you are pleasing and amusing yourself, you are 
seriously contributing to the future welfare of the country.” 
Flowers have an expression of countenance as much as men or animals. 
Some seem to smile ; some have a sad expression ; some are pensive and 
diffident; others again are plain, honest and upright, like the broad-faced sun¬ 
flower and the hollyhock. 
Henry Ward Beecher. 
Trees, that like the poplar, lift upward all their boughs, give no shade and 
no shelter, whatever their height. Trees the most lovingly shelter and shade 
us, when, like the willow, the higher soar their summits, the lower droop their, 
boughs. 
Bulwer-Lytton_ 
