THE SPRING BEAUTIES

The Puritan Spring Beauties stood freshly clad for church; A Thrush, white-breasted, o'er them sat singing on his perch. "Happy be! for fair are ye!" the gentle singer told them, But presently a buff-coat Bee came booming up to scold them. "Vanity, oh, vanity! Young maids, beware of vanity!" Grumbled out the buff-coat Bee, Half parson-like, half soldierly.

The sweet-faced maidens trembled, with pretty, pinky blushes, Convinced that it was wicked to listen to the Thrushes; And when, that shady afternoon, I chanced that way to pass, They hung their little bonnets down and looked into the grass, All because the buff-coat Bee Lectured them so solemnly:— "Vanity, oh, vanity! Young maids, beware of vanity!"