field mouse and the toad
Have burrowed; where, beside the road,
The grasshopper and katydid
All winter have been safely hid;
And when the bumblebee will come
A-booming back with pleasant hum?
April can tell you, for 'tis she
Opens the door that sets them free.

ADOPTING A GRANDMOTHER.

BY MARY STARR CONEY.

"Oh, Eloise! Where are you going?" Marjorie Blake rushed down the steps
as she caught sight of her friend dressed in her very best clothes and
carrying a small valise.

"Guess where! It's the best place in the whole world!"

"Away on the train?" questioned Marjorie eagerly.

"Of course. My grandma doesn't live here. Goodness! I told you!" laughed
Eloise. "Would you have guessed?"

"No, for I didn't know you had a grandma."

"Why, of course, I have! Haven't you?"

"No, Eloise."

"How awful!" Eloise dropped the valise in her dismay. "Why, Fannie Green
has two. I've only one, but she is the sweetest, beautifulest grandma
you ever saw. I'm awfully sorry you haven't got one. But here comes
mamma, so good-by."

After Eloise had gone away, Marjorie walked slowly back to the house.
She had never felt the loss of a grandmother before, but now it weighed
heavily upon her.

"If grandmas are so nice, it does seem as if I ought to have one," she
said to herself, "'specially as some little girls have two!" Marjorie
sat down on the steps and with heavy heart thought over the situation.

At last a plan suggested itself and she sprang to her feet.

"When Aunt Mary didn't have any little girl and wanted one; she went to
an orphan asylum and adopted one. Why can't I adopt a grandma?" Marjorie
asked herself excitedly. "I never heard of an asylum of grandmas, but
that doesn't matter! I want only one, and surely somewhere there must be
one for me."

The child looked across the street. The family in the third house were
strangers who had moved in a few days before. Marjorie was playing in
the yard when they came, and she remembered seeing an old lady go into
the house. There weren't any children over there, she knew, for she had
watched eagerly for some to appear, but none had. Maybe she could get
this old lady to be her grandma.

The little girl rushed across the street and rang the door bell. Then
her heart began a loud beating. S'pose the old lady shouldn't want to be
adopted and should act cross? The child had half a minute to run away
before anyone came to the door. B