live, you must think how much better off he will be in heaven than he is here.” "I know he will," said Ruth; "and I heard Mrs. Brown, up-stairs, telling mother what a happy release it would be for him after all his sufferings; and mother said yes, but she could not bear to part with him." Thus the two children talked until they went into school. Miss Chester was not there. She was gone into the country to attend upon a sick sister, and was not likely to return for some weeks. Another lady took charge of the class during her absence. Bessy missed her own teacher very much, for she was so kind and gentle, that Bessy always got on better with her than with any one else. She was sorry, also, on Ruth's account, because Miss Chester could not now go to see them in their trouble, as she would certainly have done if she had been at home. Bessy told her mother how much worse Ruth's father was. "Ruth does not think he will ever get well again, mother." "I should not think he would, Bessy," answered Mrs. Taylor, "for he appears to have been failing for a long time. Well, it is one comfort for his poor wife, that she will not lose her means of support through losing him. She has to work for them all now. I must try if I can call and see them; but I shall be too busy, I am afraid, next week, to get so far. But you might go to-morrow, Bessy, and inquire how he is, and take a little light pudding for him. I am going to bake, so it will not be much additional trouble; and he cannot have anything very nice at home, with his wife out all day. So the next morning the pudding was made and baked, and Bessy put it into her basket and set off with it. She found Ruth's father alone, for Ruth had gone to fetch his medicine, and had taken her little sisters with her. But Bessy did not mind, for she had become used to him now, and her shyness had worn off. She showed him the tempting pudding which she had brought. He thanked her, or rather, her mother, for it, and said that it looked very nice. "Yes; and it tastes very nice, too," said Bessy, smiling, "so you must try and eat some of it." She fetched a plate and spoon from the side table, and persuaded him to begin. It is quite warm," she said, "for it was only just out of the oven when I came, and mother covered it well up in the basket." Ruth's father took the plate from her, more to please Bessy than from any desire for food; but he found the bread-and-butter pudding so nice, that he had a second supply of it. It was almost the first mouthful he had eaten that day. It was a long while, he said, since he had tasted anything so good. And he really seemed the better for it. Bessy waited until Ruth came back with the medicine. She took Ruth's crochet work and went on with it, for she could do it very well, and she did not like to be idle. Ruth's father closed his eyes as if he were inclined to sleep. But he was disturbed by a violent fit of coughing. When it was over, he said, wearily, "Oh, this troublesome cough! I shall never get rid of it." Bessy laid down her work, and looked at him with her little face full of sympathy. Wishing to comfort him if she could, she said in reply, "But you will get rid of it, you know, when you go to heaven." 66 He seemed surprised. "But, Bessy," he said, everybody does not go to heaven.” "No," answered Bessy, in rather a troubled tone; "but then it is because they do not want to go." "Is it? Do all go there if they want, then ?" "Yes," said Bessy, "if they go in the right way." "And which is the right way ?" 66 Bessy wondered at this question. He could surely answer it as well as she could. Yet she did not like to tell him so, because he was so much older than herself; besides, he seemed so poorly that she would not trouble him to talk much. For he spoke in a very low voice, and he was forced to pause for breath between each sentence. So Bessy simply told him about Jesus Christ being the way to heaven. She mentioned one or two easy illustrations which Miss Chester had once used, in order to help them to understand this important truth. How surprised Bessy's teacher would have been had she heard her quiet little scholar repeating her words; words which she, perhaps, feared were long since forgotten and unheeded. Ruth's father listened; but he did not say any more. Was he thinking of what Bessy had been telling him; or was he tired of the subject? WE have chosen the cuckoo as the bird of May, because it is then, as the old rhyme tells us, that "she singeth all the day." The cuckoo is a summer visitor, arriving in April and leaving in July, or sometimes as late as August. For some time before it prepares to go, its note is changed. It no longer calls out "cuckoo, cuckoo," in a long and joyous note, but repeats cuc, cuc, cuc, without seeming able to finish the word as it once did. All this is noticed in the old country rhyme, "In April, In flowery May, He singeth all the day; In leafy June, He altereth his tune; Away he'll fly; Go he must." The cuckoo builds no nest, but lays an egg in the nest of some other bird. She is careful to choose for a nurse a bird which feeds on insects or worms, that her nestling may get the food which it requires. When the little cuckoo comes out of the egg, it never rests till it has destroyed all the nestlings of its nurse. It begins this cruel work before it can see. It is formed with a hollow in its broad back, and here it contrives to get the smaller birds one by one, and then, climbing with them to the edge of the nest, it jerks them over. It has often been watched while doing this, and its perseverance is wonderful. If it fall back into the nest with its burden, it will rest a little and try again, till its task is done. When it is about ten or eleven days old, the hollow in its back fills up, and it assumes the form of the parent bird. If the other nestlings were spared, the cuckoo could not get enough of food, as it is a very greedy bird; and the poor little birds who feed it, find it hard enough work to satisfy its appetite. The cuckoo seldom takes the trouble to feed her own young at all, yet now and then she has been observed to do it, for what reason we cannot tell. One person who was watching a cuckoo, saw her |