No one is so accursed by fate,
No one so utterly desolate,

But some heart, though unknown,
Responds unto his own;

Responds, as if with unseen wings
An angel touched its quivering strings,
And whispers in its song,

"Where hast thou stayed so long?"

Longfellow.

The star of Hope will beam in Sorrow's night, And smile the phantoms of Despair to flight.

"Why do you call the Snowdrop pale, Our first of flowerets bright?

Anon.

For the Christmas Rose came long before,
So did the Aconite."

I know the yellow Aconite;

I know the Christmas Rose:

But neither one nor other e'er

Within my garden grows.

They seem to me presumptuous things,

That rudely hurry on,

And struggle for the precedence

A fairer flower hath won.

When I was but a wee, wee thing,

A young Snowdrop I nursed,

And I loved it when they told me how

It always blossomed first.

I marked its tiny, trembling stem,

And dainty little bell,

And, oh! so tenderly enjoyed
Its faint, delicious smell.
It was not only fair and sweet,

'Twas the first flower that came;
So said they then, and there is none
I could love now the same.
The Aconite may deck with gold
Its merry little face—

The Christmas Rose at Christmas bloom,
But none can fill her place.
Within my garden's small domain

The Snowdrop still shall find

Herself the earliest flower. She leads,

The others come behind.

And, lo! above the heaving mould

The clustering bells hang here; Like foam upon the storm-black wave, Or pearls in Ethiop's ear.

And I know where they're crowding thick,

With none their wealth to note;—

All o'er that woody isle, that lies
Girt by the ancient moat.

There, under tall, dark crested firs,
The Snowdrops spring each year;
And shed about that gloomy place
A lightness pale and clear.

A grand old Manor House once stood
On that dim moated isle;

But long years since have floated by,
And its story died the while.
Yet roses, cultured ones, run wild,
And fruits, grown rough and sour,

That linger still around, tell tales
Of garden and of bower.
And so the Snowdrops may have dwelt
In borders neat and trim,
And gentle beings tended them,
Though now all's drear and dim.
The brave and beautiful have died,
Not e'en a name is known:—
Time hath laid low the stately house,—
Ye cannot find a stone.

But still there runneth brightly there

The little sedgy stream
Into the moat, that lieth still

And shadowy as a dream.
And still there groweth plenteously

The fragile Snowdrop's bell:—

Oh, human pride! that thou wouldst list

The tale these small things tell!

Louisa A. Twamley.

As Hope, with bowed head, silent stood,
And on her golden anchor leant,
Watching below the angry flood,

While Winter, mid the dreariment
Half-buried in the drifted snow,

Lay sleeping on the frozen ground, Not heeding how the wind did blow, Bitter and bleak on all around: She gazed on Spring, who at her feet Was looking on the snow and sleet. Spring sighed, and through the driving gale

Her warm breath caught the falling snow,

And from the flakes a flower as pale
Did into spotless whiteness blow.
Hope, smiling, saw the blossom fall,

And watched its root strike in the earth: "I will that flower the Snowdrop call,"

Said Hope, "in memory of its birth:
And through all ages it shall be
In reverence held, for love of me."
"And ever from my hidden bowers,"
Said Spring, "it first of all shall go,
And be the herald of the flowers,
To warn away the sheeted snow.
Its mission done, then by thy side

All summer long it shall remain.
While other flowers I scatter wide,

O'er every hill, and wood, and plain, This shall return, and ever be A sweet companion, Hope, for thee." Hope stooped and kissed her sister Spring,.

And said, "For hours, when thou art gone,

I'm left alone without a thing

That I can fix my heart upon:

'Twill cheer me many a lonely hour,

And in the future I shall see

Those who would sink raised by that flower;
They'll look on it, then think of thee:

And many a sadful heart shall sing,
Tho Snowdrop bringeth Hope and Spring."

Miller.

PRIMROSE.... Early Grief.

The Primrose is one of the earliest flowers of spring. It was anciently called Paralisos, the name of a beautiful youth, who died of grief for the loss of his betrothed Melicerta, and was metamorphosed by his parents into this flower, which has since been a favourite of the poets.

With fairest flowers,

Whilst summer last, and I live here, Fidele,
I'll sweeten thy sad grave: thou shalt not lack
The flower that's like thy face, pale Primrose.
Cymbeline.

The Primrose pale is Nature's meek and modest child.

Balfour.

Nay, weep not while thy sun shines bright,

And cloudless is thy day,

While past and present joys unite

To cheer thee on thy way;

While fond companions round thee move,

To youth and nature true,

And friends whose looks of anxious love

Thy every step pursue.

Common-Place Book of Poetry.

The Primrose, tenant of the glade,

Emblem of virtue in the shade.

John Mayne.