As any you'll find if you look the world over,
And always as busy as bees upon clover.
Those are not their right names, though, between you and me,
But that's what I call them in writing, you see.

They are going to school in the Hazel Dell,
To a nice young lady they love pretty well.
But whether they're better to study than play,
As I am their mamma, I'd rather not say.
And whether they've black eyes, or grey eyes, or blue,
Now guess, and I'll tell you if you guess true.

I'd like to ask your mamma, some day,
How her boy goes at his fun and his play ;
If he's always tearing and soiling his clothes,
And losing the buttons where nobody knows;
If he uses his hat for a bat and a ball,
Till at last in the mud it is certain to fall.
And then comes to his mamma to clean it up right,
And help him out of his wonderful plight.

Does he always go smiling, as all children should,
When she asks him to bring her an armful of wood ?
Does he drum, and whistle, and hammer, and shout,
Till peaceable people are quite worn out?
And I'd like to ask her if he and his brother
Ever get angry with one another?

I rather expect your mamma would laugh,
But I'd like to ask if he snowballs the calf,
If he corners the chickens, and chases the sheep,
And pulls the cat's tail as she lies asleep,
If he worries the dog till he hides from his sight,
And keeps up a tumult from morning till night?

But that would be questions enough for one day,
And mind I don't want you to think that I say
That my Jimmie and Jockie behave in this way;
I thought I'd enquire of your mamma, you know,
If she ever had seen one of her boys do so;
Of course she would answer me, , No, oh! no, no !

Tke Three Sleepers.

UR first engraving this month brings before

us a scene from Pilgrim's Progress. We hope all our young people have read this wonderful book, and seeing it is so very cheap, they all should possess a copy of their own.

The scene brought before us in the picture is thus described :-" I saw then in my dream, that he went on thus

even until he came at a bottom, where he saw, a little out of the way, three men fast asleep, with fetters upon their heels. The name of the one was Simple, another Sloth, and the third Presumption. Christian then seeing them lie in this case went to them, if peradventure he might awake them, and cried, you are like them that sleep on the top of a mast, for the Dead Sea is under you, a gulf that hath no bottom. Awake, therefore, and come away, be willing also, and I will help you off with your irons. With that they looked upon him, and began to reply in this sort: Simple, said, “I see no danger ; ” Sloth said, “Yet a little more sleep; " and Presumption said, “Every tub must stand upon its own bottom;" so they lay down to sleep again, and Christian went on his way.

Sleep is a very wonderful thing, there are mysteries about it which no man can explain. It is also a very blessed thing. God's goodness is nightly seen, in drawing the curtain of darkness over the land, and causing His great family to lie down to sleep. No doubt our young friends have sometimes stood and watched their little brothers and sisters when they were fast asleep, and they will say with us, that such a sight is very beautiful. How refreshing it is to the toil-worn labourer to lie down at night, and bathe his weary limbs in sleep. We read in the gospels how, on one occasion, when Jesus was on the lake of Genossaret, that

he was asleep, and we always think that this is one of the most interesting incidents in our Saviour's life. It is thus beautifully described by the Evangelist Mark: “And the same day when the even was come, he saith unto them, let us pass over on the other side. And when they had sent away the multitude, they took him even as he was in the ship; and there were also with Him other little ships. And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full. And he was in the hinder part of the ship, asleep on a pillow: and they awoke Him, and say unto Him, Master carest thou not that we perish? And He arose, and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace be still, and there was a great calm.”

But sometimes anxious thoughts drive away sleep. King David tells us in his wonderful Psalms that sometimes this was the case with himself; but generally his trust in God was so strong, that he was able to sleep even in the midst of the greatest dangers. The third and fourth Psalms were written, when he had to leave Jerusalem, on account of the rebellion of his son Absalom ; and yet in the third Psalm, he

says, I laid me down and slept; I awaked for the Lord sustained me.” And in the next Psalm he says, “I will lay me down in peace and sleep : for thou Lord only makest me dwell in safety.” But at other times David tells us he could not sleep on account of his trouble and sorrow. A great poet has described one of our English Kings, who through the pressure of care was not able to sleep, and he is represented as asking sleep to explain how it was, that the poor

could sleep in their homely cottages, nay even the sailor lad could sleep in the midst of a storm, and yet he, the King, in the midst of all his riches and greatness was not able to sleep. We will now quote you the passage, it is perhaps rather too difficult for you to understand fully at the first reading, but if you will read it twice through, we think

Sleep, gentle sleep:
Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down,
And steep my senses in forgetfulness?
Why, rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs,
Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee,
And hush'd with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber ;
Than in the perfumed chambers of the great,
Under the canopies of costly state,
And lulld with sounds of sweetest melody?
O, thou dull god, why liest thou with the vile
In loathsome beds : and leav'st the kingly couch
A watch-case, or a common 'larum bell?
Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast
Seal up the ship-boy's eyes and rock his brains
In cradle of the rude imperious surge ;
And in the visitation of the winds,
Who take the ruffian billows by the top,
Curling their monstrous heads, and hanging them
With deafening clamours on the slippery clouds,
That, with the burly, death itself awakes?
Canst thou, O, partial sleep! give thy repose
To the wet sea-boy, in an hour so rude;
And in the calmest and most stillest night,
With all appliances and means to boot,

Deny it to a King ?
But while care keeps

some persons 'awake when they ought to be asleep, sloth keeps others asleep when they ought to be awake. They have no wholesome love of work. All through life they are a few minutes behind. They have no notion of taking time by the forelock. They are always wondering how in the world it happens that so many difficulties cross their path, but at the bottom they don't like work. Solomon had his eyes upon men of this sort, hence we read in the Book of Proverbs :-" As the door turneth upon his hinges, so doth the slothful upon his bed.” Again he says :-“I went by the field of the slothful, and lo! it was all grown over with thorns, and nettles had covered the face thereof, and the stone wall thereof was broken down. Then I saw and considered it well : I looked upon it and