32 OUR ROBINS.

thought it any reason why we should not, that she lived
on a little farm, and in an old, small house, and I in one
of the best in the village; nor that she dressed in very
common clothes, and that mine, being purchased in the city,
were a little better and smarter than any bought in the
country. It was not the bonnets and gowns we cared for,
but the heads and hearts those bonnets and gowns covered.
 The very morning after Mrs. Bradly's arrival in S-,
her eldest son, Lyman, a boy ten years old, came to ask
me to go and see his mother. "Mother," he said, "was
not very well, and wanted very much to see Miss S-."
So I went home with him. -
 After walking half a mile along the road, I proposed
getting over the fence and going across the field. So we
got into the field, and pursued our way along the little
noisy brook that, cutting Lyman's farm in two, winds its
way down the hill,-sometines taking a jump of five or
six feet; then murmuring over the stones, or playing
round the bare roots of the old trees, as a child fondles
about its parent,-and finally steals off among the flowers
it nourishes, the brilliant cardinals and snow-white cle-
matis, till it mingles with the river that winds through
our meadows. I would advise my young friends to choose
the fields for their walks. Nature has always something
in store for those who love her and seek her favours.
You will be sure to see more birds in the green fields than
on the roadside. Secure from the boys who may be idling
along the road, leady to let fly stones at them, they rest
longer on the perch and feel more at home there. Then,
as Lyman and I did, you will find many a familiar flower
that, in these by-places, will look to you like the face of
a friend. And you may chance to make a new acquaint-
ance; and, in that case, you will take pleasure in picking
it, and carrying it home, and learning its name of some
one wiser than you are. Most persons are curious to
know the names of men and women whom they never saw
before, and never may see again. This is idle curiosity;
but often in learning the common name of a flower or
plant, we learn something of its character or use.