Autumn Leaflets.

AUTUMN LEAFLETS .

TTiOTTINGS among the quiet and sombre shadows that flit between the " all things ¦* - ' bright ancl beautiful" of summer , and the cold , dreary wastes of winter—shadows that come and go in solemn warning of that deeper shade fast darkening round us all . And yet some autumn pictures , in their golden store of wealth in lesson and precept , surpass thc more highly tinted ones of summer . There is something grand , serious , stirring in the decay now going on around us—knowing as we do that the All-wise

Architect of our universe will once more clothe the earth with renewed glory in the spring-time—that the sere ancl yellow leaves , which lie in heaps on all sides , are not lost , but that each will bear its part iu the attainment of a bright and joyous resurrection in the future . So like our own lives here ! Youth ' s buds , manhood's blossoms should bring age ' s fruit , that , when our own tree dies , its leaves , withered and fallen round the trunk , under our Father ' s hand may bloom again in heaven nevermore to

fade . Yet how many can say that the germs implanted in our natures have received that nourishment and care needful , to produce one single flower ? 0 then ! how few whose fruit has ripened to perfection ! Each } r ear that has passed has shown the same great lesson written plainly on the whole face of nature—the same truth peeping forth from every fallen leaf dying everyday—the same precept in the bare and naked branches showing weird and ghostlike against the dull ancl leaden sky . Leaves fallen and falling still , and even as we gaze on them we send one little thought back to

"The spring-time of their age , " when bright and beautiful they decked the earth with gladness , and now , their course run , their mission ended—the dead shadows of a long ago—they beckon us to follow . It may be that such truths shine out with brighter force to one who in " The chance and change of a sailor ' s life , Want and lentrest and strife

py , , " has passed the summer months upon the bosom of the great deep , where day succeeds to clay , ancl , save in a greater ruffling now ancl again of the placid mirror o ' er ivhich he floats , there is nothing changeable in the eternal waste of " Water , water , everywhere . "

Human nature knows not the value of that it enjoys till its loss has taught its estimate aright . "The sea , the sea , the bounding sea . " What poet has not sung its praise , what writer has not woven its silvery ripples amongst his fairest flowerswhat painter has not ined to catch its

ever-, p gorgeous changing beauties , what earth-bom heart but yearns at times ancl seasons for the sublime , the immeasurable " waste of waters ?" Hands innumerable are stretched out longingly towards the substance , but they alone who grasp it find it but a shadow . Who but they can realize the vivid picture given by the " Ancient Mariner , " — -

" Day after day , day after day We stuck , nor breath , nor motion , As idle as a painted ship Upon a painted ocean ?" With nothing but sky and sea on every side , the monotony becomes so tedious that 11