of grace and vigor; he is said to make 
leaps of eighteen feet or more. His 
sight is keenest in the dusk and by- 
night; his sense of smell is deficient but 
his hearing is extremely acute. 
The lair in which the female brings 
forth her young is usually in a shallow 
cavern on the face of some inaccessible 
cliff or ledge of rocks. 
In the southern states, Audubon says, 
where there are no caves or rocks, the 
lair of the puma is generally in a very 
dense thicket or in a canebrake. It is 
a rude sort of bed of sticks, weeds, 
leaves and grasses. The number of 
cubs is from two to five. In captivity 
two usually are born, but sometimes 
only one. 
THE HOLLY TREE. 
0 reader! hast thou ever stood to see 
The Holly tree? 
The eye that contemplates it, well perceives 
Its glossy leaves, 
Ordered by an intelligence so wise 
As might confound the atheist's sophistries. 
Below a circling fence its leaves are seen 
Wrinkled and keen; 
No grazing cattle through their prickly round 
Can reach to wound; 
But as they grow where nothing is to fear, 
Smooth and unarmed the pointless leaves appear. 
1 love to view these things with curious eyes, 
And moralize; 
And in this wisdom of the Holly tree 
Can emblem see 
Wherewith perchance to make a pleasant rhyme, ' 
One which may profit in the after-time. 
Thus, though abroad perchance I might appear 
Harsh and austere, 
To those who on my leisure would intrude 
Reserved and rude, 
Gentle at home amid my friends I'd be 
Like the high leaves upon the Holly tree. 
And should my youth, as youth is apt, I know, 
Some harshness show, 
All vain asperities I day by day 
Would wear away, 
Till the smooth temper of my age should be 
Like the high leaves upon the Holly tree. 
And as when all the summer trees are seen 
So bright and green, 
The Holly leaves a sober hue display 
Less bright than they, 
But when the bare and wintry woods we see, 
What then so cheerful as the Hollv tree? 
—Robert Southey. 
