wish I could win one!' a lassie was sighing,
When sitting quite still in a meadow one day,
And thinking of prizes not won without trying—
Not won by mere wishing as time slips away.
And as she sat wishing she heard a hen clucking;
She lifted her eyes and that hen she could see,
And soon it was rapidly scratching and chucking—
As gay and as busy and glad as could be.
She watched how it struggled to upturn a treasure,
A thing it was wishing for, something to eat,
A worm to be dug for with patience and pleasure!
'Twas found, and it gave Henny-Penny a treat!
That worm the hen wished for she could not have eaten
Unless she had scratched it right up from the ground;
And Mabel had seen that the hen was not beaten—
By carefully working the prize had been found.
So Mabel thought quietly over the matter,
And learnt the good lesson, 'No prize can be won
By thinking and wishing, by waiting and chatter!'
And soon she jumped up and to work she begun.
D. H.
FREED IN VAIN.
Prince, the parrot, was a proud and happy bird; he was proud of his gorgeous red and green feathers, of his ability to say 'Pretty Poll' and 'How do?' and, above all, of his fine gilded cage, which stood just inside the breakfast-room window.
But, in an evil hour, Prince, watching the birds which flew to and fro outside the glass, was struck with a desire for freedom. He thought no more of his splendid feathers, or his handsome cage; but, from morning till night, he wondered how he should get out. There was not wit enough in his parrot brain to make him understand that the cold English garden was not in the least like the flowery forest of his native island.