OUR POST-OFFICE BOX.
Lowell, Massachusetts.
I would like to know how old is the festival of St. Valentine's Day. I have painted some little cards myself, and am going to send them to my school-mates. I think that is better than buying them, even if I can not make them quite so pretty. I am going to copy a little verse on the back of each one. Mamma has chosen the verses for me.
S. F. W.
There is no clear record of the origin of St. Valentine's Day. St. Valentine himself was a priest of Rome who was martyred some time during the third century, but he had nothing to do with the peculiar observance of his day. In ancient Rome a great part of the month of February was devoted to feasts in honor of Pan and Juno, during which the young men drew by lot the name of their companion for the festivities. It is supposed that this ancient custom changed gradually into the present observance of the day. Many allusions to St. Valentine's Day are found in English poetry of the earliest date, as the festival was much more generally observed four centuries ago than now.
Peekskill, New York.
I am a little boy eight years old. I want to tell you that papa heard a bluebird sing in a chestnut-tree on January 11. I have six cats and three ducks. One of my cats died last week, and I buried her. Poor Susie!
S. B. H.
The little bluebird must have left its winter-quarters in the Southern States, and travelled with the warm wave which swept northward in January. It is to be hoped it will escape being frozen to death, and live to sing its sweet spring song at a more seasonable time.