4. Night is shutting in. Every moment the air darkens. The wind is coming in earnest. The chimney roars with a hollow and shuddering sound. There is no use looking out any more; all is black. Drop the curtains. Throw on the logs. The flames fill the whole room with a warm glow. Draw round the table; for now one has the full sense of home security. The wind comes in gusts, and smites the house till it groans; and at times you distinctly feel that it rocks under you. The blacker the night, the more turbulent the wind, the wilder the storm, all the more does each one within rejoice in the contrast. No such night at home in the country as a real stormy night.

5. But the young imagination is keen, and summons all its treasures. It hears in the wind voices of distress. Then come stories of wolves and benighted travelers. As the wind comes shrilly through cracks or key-holes, one starts, as if a shriek sounded in his very ear. Now and then comes a buffet against the window, a straining and tugging at the side of the house, as if the night were seeking to storm the castle, and break in all its defenses.

6. At length, one by one, we creep off to bed. We cuddle close together, and pull the clothes over our heads to deaden the sound, as well as to keep out the snow. For no double windows protected the old-fashioned house, and fine snow, sifting in, filled the air; and often the morning found scarfs of snow upon the bed.

move.

7. But what a morning! The sun is up. The wind has now gone down. The snow has ceased to fall, but not to It is drifting in every direction. It hangs over the eaves. It has buried the kitchen door. Fences are all gone. It is a new land, a fairy land. Yonder is the top of a haystack, and beyond, the roofs of the sheds. The barn yet towers up in sight. Woe to them who have no wood-sheds, and who now must dig out the unsheltered pile!

8. A way must be cut through the drift that buries the front door. Paths must be opened. Every one in the neighborhood is busy. All intercourse is cut off. It will be late in the day before one can get to another, and perhaps several days before one village can communicate with another. For the roads are to be "broken out." The people turn out one and all. Men, boys, cattle, all work with a will. Indeed, it is more like play than work..

9. Now, then, we are ready for settled winter! Two or three feet of snow on a level, that will lie for two months! As soon as the snow hardens a little, one can take his own direction across the country. Not a fence can be seen. Swamps can now be entered safely. The streams need no bridges. The woods are full of men getting out the year's fuel. Every one is glad. Snow now is the poor man's friend, and the working-man's helper; while all the young people who love frolic are getting ready for sleigh-rides. Winter in the country is the year's holiday.

DEFINITIONS.

H. W. Beecher.

De cid ́u ous, falling off, like the leaves of trees; having leaves that fall off every year.

Säun'ter ing, wandering about idly.

Weird, suggesting witchcraft; wild; unearthly.

LESSON LXIII.

UNDER THE SNOW.

1. The brown old earth lies quiet and still
Under the snow,

The furrows are hid on the broken hill

Under the snow,

Everything is fringed with mossy pearl,
The drooping cedars bend to the ground,
The rose-bush is drifted into a mound,

And still from the silent sky to the ground
The white flakes noiselessly whirl.

2. The roads and fields are buried deep
Under the snow,

The hedges lie in a tangled heap
Under the snow.

And the little gray rabbits under them creep,
While the twittering sparrows cunningly peep
From the sheltering briers, and cosily sleep
Under the snow.

3. The rough old barn and the sheds near by,
The mounted straw of the wheat and rye,
Are covered with snow;

The straggling fences are softened with down,
Every post is white, with a beautiful crown
Of drifted snow.

4. And I think, as I sit in the gloaming here, Watching the objects disappear,

How many things are folded low

Under the drifts of the falling snow:

There are hearts that once were full of love
Under the snow;

There are eyes that glowed with the soul of love
Under the snow;

There are faded tresses of golden hair;

There are locks that were bleached with the frost of care;

There are lips that once were like the rose;

There are bosoms that once were stung with woes;

There are breasts that once were true and strong;
There are forms that once were praised in song:

O, there's a strange and a mighty throng
Under the snow!

5. Another mound will soon lie deep
Under the snow,

And I shall with the pale ones sleep
Under the snow.

O God! stream on my soul Thy grace,
That in the love-light of Thy face
I may rejoice, when death shall place
My pulseless heart and body low
Under the snow!

John H. Bonner.

LESSON LXIV.

WINTER BEAUTY.

1. Nature is very exacting. You may make her a flying visit in August, and she will, indeed, unfold to you the beauties of dew-drop, and thunder-shower, and evening sky; but to know her in her wholeness, to drink in full measure the "life that hides in marsh and wold," to conceive all her magnificent possibilities, you must woo her from New Year to New Year, and every New Year shall bring you a fairer picture, a richer blessing, than the last.

2. You shall look out upon a gray, frozen earth, and a gray, chilling sky. The trees stretch forth to you their naked branches as if imploringly. The air pinches and pierces you; a homesick desolation clasps around your shivering, shrinking heart; and then God works a miracle. The windows of

heaven are opened, and thence comes forth a blessing. The gray, wintry sky unlocks her treasures; and softness, and whiteness, and warmth, and beauty float gently down upon both the evil and the good.

. 3. Through all the long night, while you sleep, the work goes noiselessly on. Earth puts off her earthliness; and when the morning comes, she stands before you in the white robes of a saint. The sun hallows her with baptismal touch, and she is glorified. There is no longer on her pure brow anything common or unclean.

4. The Lord God hath wrapped her about with light as with a garment. His divine charity hath covered the multitude of her sins; and there is no scar or stain, no "mark of her shame," no "seal of her sorrow."

5. The far-off hills swell their white purity against the pure blue of the heavens. The sheeted splendor of the fields sparkles back a thousand suns for one. The trees lose their nakedness and misery and desolation, and every slenderest twig is clothed upon with glory. All the roofs are blanketed with snow; all the fences are bordered. Every gate-post is statuesque; every wood-pile is a marble quarry. Harshest outlines are softened. Instead of angles and ruggedness and squalor, there are billowy, fleecy undulations.

6. Nothing so rough, so common, so ugly, but it has been transfigured into newness of life. Everywhere the earth has received "beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness." Without sound of hammer or ax, without the grating of saw or the click of chisel, prose has been sculptured into poetry. The actual has put on the silver vail of the ideal.

7. Will you look more closely? A part is, if possible, more beautiful than the whole. On the texture of your coatsleeve one wandering snow-flake has alighted. Gaze at it before it vanishes from your sight. What a world of symmetry