I know the flower in your hand fades while you look at it. The dream that allures you glimmers and is gone. But flower and dream, like youth itself, are buds and prophecies. For where, without the perfumed blossoming of the spring orchards all over the hills and among all the valleys of New England and New York, would the happy harvests of New York and New England be? And where, without the dreams of the young men lighting the future with human possibility, would be the deeds of the old men, dignifying the past with human achievement? How deeply does it become us to believe this, who are not only young ourselves, but living with the youth of the youngest nation in history. I congratulate you that you are young; I congratulate you that you are Americans. Like you, that country is in its flower, not yet in its fruit, and that flower is subject to a thousand chances before the fruit is set. Worms may destroy it, frosts may wither it, fires may blight it, gusts may whirl it away; but how gorgeously it still hangs blossoming in the garden of time, while its penetrating perfume floats all round the world, and intoxicates all other nations with the hope of liberty. Knowing that the life of every nation, as of each individual, is a battle, let us remember, also, that the battle is to those who fight with faith and undespairing devotion. Knowing that nothing is worth fighting for at all unless God reigns, let us, at least, believe as much in the goodness of God as we do in the dexterity of the devil. And, viewing this prodigious spectacle of our country--this hope of humanity, this young America, _our_ America--taking the sun full in its front, and making for the future as boldly and blithely as the young David for Goliath, let us believe with all our hearts, and from that faith shall spring the fact that David, and not Goliath, is to win the day; and that, out of the high-hearted dreams of wise and good men about our country, Time, however invisibly and inscrutably, is, at this moment, slowly hewing the most colossal and resplendent result in history. A HIDDEN WORLD. OLIVE E. DANA, an American journalist. In the _New England Journal_. The hidden world lies in the hand of God, Waiting, like seed, to fall on the sod; Tranquil its lakes were, and lovely its shores, While idly each stream o'er the fretting rocks pours. Its forests are fair and its mines fathomless, Grand are its mountains in their loftiness; Its fields wait the plow, and its harbors the ships, No sail down the blue of the water-way slips. God keeps in his palm, through centuries dim, This hid, idle seed. It belongeth to him. Away in a corner, where God only knows, The seed when he plants it quickens and grows. The pale buds unfold as the nations pass by, The fragrance is grateful, the blooms multiply, But it is blossom time, this what we see; Who knows what the fullness of harvest will be. COLUMBIA THE QUEEN OF THE WORLD.