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F. That is a strange question. Did you not see that where the cows stepped on the ground, they made marks or steps?

D. Yes, but a track is not a road. F. True; but where cattle walk along every day, and make tracks, they soon wear the grass away, and tread the ground hard, and that makes a path.

D. Now I know what makes a road. Cattle, and men, and carts, and wagons, and chaises, and many other things go along and wear the ground smooth.

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F. Yes, and sometimes the high places are plowed or dug, and the dirt is thrown upon the low places to make the road level.

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THE BOY AND HIS BIRD, OR THE SPOILED BUTTERFLY.

Young Rudolph came running out of the garden in wild joy, and exclaimed, "What a beautiful bird I have found!

"It sat on a flower, and its wings shone like pure silver and gold; and now I will feed it with care, and preserve it from harm."

"Well then, my son," said the father, "let me see also, and admire your wonderful bird."

Then Rudolph put his hand quickly into his bosom, and brought out a beautiful butterfly.

But behold! the wings of the bird had lost their splendor, and the colored dust was found upon the fingers of the boy, and its tender wings were sadly torn.

And Rudolph sighed when he saw the pretty creature was ruined, for he said, it no longer resembled the pretty bird that sat on the lily, and he threw it upon the ground.

But the father said, "Why are you angry? Is it the fault of the bird that it was formed too tenderly to endure the rashness with which you seized it in your hands?"

Alas! how much both of beauty and innocence have been ruined by the rashness, folly, and ignorance of mankind!

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CAROLINE AND HER CANARY BIRD.

A little girl, named Caroline, had a sweet little canary bird. It sang from morning till night.

It was a beautiful creature, yellow as gold, with a black head. Caroline gave him seeds and groundsel to eat, and sometimes a small piece of sugar; and fresh water to drink ev ery day.

But all at once the bird became dull; and one morning, when Caroline brought him some water, he lay dead at the bottom of his cage.

She burst into tears at the loss of her bird, and wept for a long time. Her mother, to comfort her, went and bought another bird, which was more beautiful than the first, and just as lovely in its song, and put it in the cage.

But Caroline wept still more when she saw this new bird. Her mother was surprised and said, "My dear child, why are you still weeping and

sorrowful? Your tears will not call the dead bird into life, and here is another bird, even better than the one you have lost."

But Caroline said, "O mother! I was not kind to the poor, dead bird, as I ought to have been, and did not do all for it that I could and should have done."

"My dear Caroline," said her mother, "you have always waited on him very carefully."

"O no, mother, not always," re-. plied the child, "only just before he died, I did not carry him a lump of sugar you gave me for him. I ate it myself." Thus spake the girl with a sorrowful heart.

Now if little Caroline wept and mourned, when she thought how she had abused her poor bird; how wretched must some bad children feel, when their parents die, to think how unkind they have been to them?

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