Beside the bank the stately trees Waved gently to and fro, And flitting specks of sunlight fell The leafy branches thro’, And danced among the tall keen reeds, And on the water fell, Where the merry fish were glancing swift; And the water snake, as well, Came, gliding in a graceful curl All silently and still, Like a lord in his own dominions there, Swimming about at will. Now toward the margin where we stood We saw him steering on,-- Then under groups of lily leaves The happy thing was gone. And wild-fowl, water-rats, and all, Lived in that little lake; Oh, what a pleasant picture now My thoughts of it awake! Its margent of smooth lawny turf Was mossy, soft, and deep, Where the shadows broad of the beech and oak Seemed quietly to sleep. The rhododendrons, purple yet With many a massive wreath, Had seedling plants, a countless host, Crowding the turf beneath. I dearly love small relics brought From spots where I have been, That seem to certify the facts Of memory’s pictured scene; But seeds and roots of flowers are The pleasantest of all;-- I’ve Broom-seeds from a heathy glen, And ferns from an old stone wall. Of wall-flower slips and roots I’ve got So many, that I’m fain, Dear as they are to me, to turn Many adrift again. My ivy-plant from Tintern’s braved Four winters’ stormy weather; I’ve scraps, too, from proud Kenilworth, And here they grow together. The feathery seeds of clematis In Goodrich I have caught; Hartstongue from Ragland’s lofty keep, With maiden-hair, I brought. And so at Claremont, where the crowd Of rhododendrons grew, My whims were humoured, and I now Am rearing one or two. And e’en those little things can bring Before me, passing well, The very nook where the scented leaves Of the graceful calamus dwell. _Louisa A. Twamley._ BROOM.... _Humility_. Thomas Miller thus speaks of the “bonny Broom,” in his Romance of Nature:--