Remember me, I pray; but not In Flora’s gay and blooming hour, When every brake hath found its note, And sunshine smiles in every flower; But when the falling leaf is sere, And withers sadly from the tree, And o’er the ruins of the year Cold autumn weeps,--remember me. _Edward Everett._ * * * * * The north wind howls; but, sheltered safe, and warm, Howl as it may, we feel secure from danger: The fire burns blue, “betokening a storm”-- A brand falls down, “precursor of a stranger.” My thoughtful mind runs o’er the track of years, When, tongs in hand, at our old hearth I sat, And poked the embers, till my mother’s fears Broke in upon the usual social chat, “You’ll fire the chimney, son!” The sparks would fly, Like little lumps of lightning up the flue, And snap and crackle as they soared on high, As if they felt some pleasure in it too! That fire is out--that hearth is cold--and they Who felt its pleasant warmth have mostly passed away. _MacKellar._ ANEMONE.... _Forsaken_. Anemone was a nymph, beloved by Zephyr. Flora, jealous of her, banished her from her court and transformed her into a flower, that blows before the return of spring. Zephyr has abandoned this unhappy beauty to the rude caresses of Boreas, who, unable to gain her love, harshly shakes her, half opens her blossoms, and causes her immediately to fade. An Anemone, with these words, _Brevis est usus_--“Her reign is short”--is touchingly expressive of the transitory nature of beauty. In spring the green woods of merry England are covered with the flowers of the Anemone. Turn the eye whichever way you will, there it greets you like “a pleasant thought;” it forms a bed of flowers around the foot of the mighty oak, and below the tangling brambles, which you may peep between, but cannot pass,--there, also, are its pearly blossoms bending. The Greeks named it the flower of the Wind, and so plentiful is it in our country that we might fancy the breeze had blown it everywhere. The gaudy Anemone of the garden, the emblem of forsaken love, is known to all; but our favourites are the uncultivated offspring of the windy woods, which come long before the broad green leaves hang overhead to shelter them. * * * * * All flowers will droop in absence of the sun That waked their sweets. _Dryden._ * * * * * Farewell! I’ve loved thee much!--I feel That my idolatry was deep; I know my heart can never heal, Till in the grave my passions sleep. Yet I upbraid thee not, my love; ’Twas all I had to offer thee, Love in its own simplicity. How could I deem thou wouldst approve? How hope to draw an angel from above? _Willis._ ACACIA.... _Friendship_.