But you must have hope, and you must have faith, You must love and be strong-and so

If you work, if you wait, you will find the place Where the four-leaf clovers grow.

THE RHODODENDRON BELLS.

Across the warm night's subtle dusk,
Where linger yet the purple light
And perfume of the wild, sweet musk-
So softly glowing, sofily bright,
Tremble the rhododendron bells,
The rose-pink rhododendron bells.

Tall, slender trees of evergreen

That know the moist winds of the sea,
And narrow leaves of satin's sheen,
And clusters of sweet mystery -
Mysterious rhododendron bells,

Rare crimson rhododendron bells.

O harken-hush! And lean thy ear,
Tuned for an elfin melody,

And tell me now, dost thou not hear
Those voices of pink mystery-

Voices of silver-throated bells,

Of breathing, rhododendron bells?

SUNRISE ON THE WILLAMETTE.

The sun sinks downward thro' the silver mist
That looms across the valley, fold on fold,
And sliding thro' the fields that dawn has kissed,
Willamette sweeps, a chain of liquid gold.

Trails onward ever, curving as it goes,
Past many a hill and many a flowered lea,
Until it pauses where Columbia flows,

Deep-tongued, deep-chested, to the waiting sea.

O lovely vales thro' which Willamette slips!

O vine-clad hills that hear its soft voice call! My heart turns ever to those sweet, cool lips

That, passing, press each rock or grassy wall.

Thro' pasture lands, where mild-eyed cattle feed,
Thro' marshy flats, where velvet tules grow,
Past many a rose tree, many a singing reed,
I hear those wet lips calling, calling low.

The sun sinks downward thro' the trembling haze, The mist flings glistening needles high and higher, And thro' the clouds-O fair beyond all praise! Mount Hood leaps, chastened, from a sea of fire.

THE EYES THAT CANNOT WEEP.

The saddest eyes are those that cannot weep;
The loneliest breast the one that sobbeth not;
The lips and mind that are most parched and hot
Are those that cannot pray, and cannot sleep-
It is the silent grief that sinketh deep.

To weep out sorrow is the common lot-
To weep it out and let it be forgot-

But tears and sobs are after all but cheap,
We weep for worries, frets and trifling cares,
For toys we've broken, and for hopes that were,
And fancied woes of passing love affairs;

But only One can ease the breast of her Whose hurt for fruitless moans has gone too deen. Pity, O God, the eyes that cannot weep.

THE LAMP IN THE WEST.

Venus has lit her silver lamp
Low in the purple west,
Breathing a soft and mellow light
Upon the sea's full breast;

It is the hour when mead and wood
In fine seed-pearls are dressed.

Far out, far out the restless bar

Starts from a troubled sleep,

Where roaring thro' the narrow straits
The meeting waters leap;

But still that shining pathway leads
Across the lonely deep.

When I sail out the narrow straits
Where unknown dangers be,
And cross the troubled, moaning bar
To the mysterious sea-

Dear God, wilt thou not set a lamp

Low in the west for me?

WHEN THE BIRDS GO NORTH AGAIN.

Oh, every year hath its winter,

And every year hath its rain;
But a day is always coming

When the birds go north again.

When new leaves swell in the forest,
And grass springs green on the plain,
And the alder's veins turn crimson,
And the birds go north again.

Oh, every heart hath its sorrow,
And every heart hath its pain;
But a day is always coming

When the birds go north again.

"Tis the sweetest thing to remember,
If courage be on the wane,
When the cold, dark days are over-
Why, the birds go north again.

L

Mrs. Higginson is, however, winning her greatest fame as a short-story writer. Her ability in this field of lit erature was recognized in the stories she wrote for the Oregon Vidette, which suspended publication some years ago.

She afterwards won a prize of $500 offered by

McClure's Magazine for the best short story, "The Takin' of Old Mis' Lane," having for her competitors many of the best American writers. Since that time her stories have appeared in the Century, Harper's Weekly, McClure's Magazine, Cosmopolitan, Lippincott's, Frank Leslie's Illustrated Weekly, and other leading publications of the East.

These stories of Western life have been published in two volumes, "The Forest Orchid" and "The Flower That Grew in the Sand," the title of the latter volume being subsequently changed by the Macmillans to "The Land of the Snow Pearls." Of the author as a story writer, the Overland Monthly says: "Her style is strong, powerful and realistic. She writes from the heart, of the plain, every-day folk she meets, and consequently she touches the heart. Her stories are unpretentious tales of common people, told simply and naturally, yet so vivid and graphic are they, that they charm the reader from the first to the last. She is as keen a student of human nature as she is a close observer of incident and detail, and her sympathetic comprehension of the trials. and joys, the hardships and the romances of humble, hard-working people who constitute her characters, and her ability to interpret them with such dramatic power and delicacy of touch as to make the commonplace beautiful, are among the strongest features of her work."

Of her as a story writer, the Chicago Tribune said: "She has shown a breadth of treatment and knowledge of human verities that equals much of the best work of France.". The New York Independent says: "Some of the incidents are sketched so vividly and so truthfully that persons and things come out of the page as if life itself were there." In the Outlook we are told that “she is one of the best American short-story writers." From Public Opinion we learn that "no Eastern writer can do such work better." And the Picayune announces that "she writes of the far West with the sympathy of one who loves it."

The following story, "The Isle of the Lepers," is here given as an illustration of her tremendous power in her chosen field of literary effort:

THE ISLE OF THE LEPERS.

There was an awful beauty on the Gulf of Georgia that summer night. It was as if all the golds and scarlets and purples of the sunset had been pounded to a fine dust and rolled in from the ocean in one great opaline mist.

The coloring of the sky began in the east with a pale green that changed delicately to salmon, and this to rose, and the rose to crimson-and so on down to the west where the sun was sinking into a gulf of scarlet, through which all the fires of hell seemed to be pouring up their flames and sparks. Long, luminous rays slanted through the mist and withdrew swiftly, like searchlights -having found all the lovely wooded islands around which the burning waves were clasping hands and kissing. The little clouds that had journeyed down to see what was going on in that scarlet gulf must have been successful in their quest, for they were fleeing back with the red badge of knowledge on each breast. Only the snow-mountains stood aloof, white, untouched-types of eternal purity.

Through all that superb riot of color that heralded the storm which was sweeping in from the ocean, moved a little boat, with a flapping sail, lazily. In it were a man and a woman. The woman was the wife of the

man's best friend.

They had left Vancouver-and all else-behind them in the early primrose dawn. Trying to avoid the courses of steamers, they had lost their own, and were drifting.

In less than an hour the storm was upon them. All the magnificent coloring had given place to whiteedged black. Occasionally a scarlet thread of lightning was cast, crinkling, along the west. Then, in a moment, followed the deep fling and roar of the thunder. Fierce squalls came tearing up the straits where the beautiful mist had trembled.

The little boat went straining and hissing through the sea. As each squall struck her the sail bellied to the water. There was no laughter now, no love-glow, on the faces in that boat; they were white as death, and their eyes were wild. Veins like ropes stood out in the