And the fair meadows of the soul Forever fresh with streams From the long heights of youth that roll, The Righi-Culm of dreams. We speak of summits hard to gain, And, gained, still hard to keep; Of pleasure bought with glorious pain, Of tears ’twas heaven to weep; And of a blessed Heavenly Friend Who, struggling with us still, Would break the blows else like to bend The lonely human will; Or with some sudden vital touch, At pinch of sorest need, Would lift our little strength to much, And energize our deed. Our talk flows on, through strain or rest, As up the steep we go; Each untried track of thought seems best In hope’s prelusive glow. We loiter while the sun makes haste, But we shall yet sit down To watch the gleams of sunset chased From mountain crown to crown. Too long, too late—the splendor went Or e’er we reached the goal; But a splendor had dawned that will never be spent That day on either soul. VEGETABLE VILLAINS. By R. TURNER. THE PLANT COMMUNITY AND ITS VILLAINS. No paradise could be complete for us without a pervading freshness of green in wood and field. In lazy moods and calm sunshiny weather there are few men who will not condescend to stretch out their limbs under a spreading beech, or at least to envy one who is taking life easily for a time in the shade. We all know what a pleasant faint rustle of leaves there is above, and what a flickering of mellowed sunlight comes over the eyes, and how these steal into the heart with a sense of soft content, till we are apt to become like little children, enjoying without much thought, yielding ourselves up to the delight of the mere living, letting our consciousness float along lazily on the current of being. But if we can in such circumstances nerve ourselves to reflect just a little, we shall—if we possess even a very slight knowledge of the processes of nature—become conscious that there are great silent energies and activities at work around us in every blade of grass, and above us in the cool green foliage. The leaves have myriads of invisible little mouths eagerly drinking in the unseen air, and the minute grains that give the green color to these leaves are all the while laying hold of the infinitesimal percentage of carbonic acid impurity in that air, and, invigorated by the quickening sunlight, are able to tear this gaseous impurity to pieces, to wrench the two elements that form it asunder, making the one into nutriment for themselves, and letting the other go free in its purity into the wide atmosphere. What man—with all his sound and fury, his hammering and clanking—has never achieved, is thus quietly done in summer days by every green leaf in God’s world, and inorganic matter is forced to live. While the sun shines these honest workers are striving with all their might to lay hold of every atom of this gas that fouls the