"Lyttel Jacke Horner sate inne ye Corner,

Eating a Christe-Masse Pye,

Hee putte inne hys Thumbe,

And pulled oute a Plumbe,

And cryed What a goode Ladde am I!'"

After this famous occurrence, however, Cornerwise became a different place. Sometimes when something or other makes a little hole in a hedge, other things pass through, and the hole widens into a breach. And so it was with our Cornerwise : one cherished abuse after another became swept away in the great stream of time; so that it is now so practical and commonplace a little town, that you would not know it if you found yourself in it.

THE SORROWS OF SPINNIKIN.

Y dear," said the old Spider to her youngest child, "you will never get on in the world if you don't take more pains."

“Oh never mind me, mamma," remarked the hopeful Spiderling; "I daresay I shall get on somehow; and, at any rate, I don't mean to trouble my head about it yet. I don't care!" "You don't know the end Don't Care' came to, I daresay," replied her mother; "do you know he was hanged ?"

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Well, that is what happens to me every day of my life," remarked the Spider pertly," when you cut off my thread, down I must come headforemost; and it is lucky my brains are easily reversible!"

The old Spider shrugged up her shoulders in

despair and went off to her net, while the thoughtless "Spinnikin" sat comfortably down in a corner to discuss the cold remains of a bee.

"Oh Spinnikin, Spinnikin!" cried her mother, from the top bud of a high hollyhock, "you don't call this neat work, do you? Every bit of it will have to be picked out again. Why, here is not a straight line in it; and your rounds are more like squares !"

"Never mind," said Spinnikin, "I am not fond of net-making. I like to enjoy myself, and I shall do it until I am obliged to get settled in life. I like scrambling up and down the stalks, and swinging from the top of the branches; and then there's always plenty of cold fly in the larder!"

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And, pray, who provides it?" inquired the old Spider severely. "When I was your age I was forced to make my own nets, and the experience of many a hungry day taught me to make them well, too! But what is to become you when I am gone I can't think."

of

"Never mind now," answered Spinnikin, “I

don't care.

Come and taste some of the bee, I can tell you it's uncommonly tender and

sweet!"

And then when Spinnikin had finished her lunch, she went to the end of the hollyhock bough, and let herself down by the help of a thread; and her friend, the Breeze, came up to play with her, and he swung her till she was so tired she could hardly climb up again.

"You won't have quite so much time for such frolics one of these days!" remarked a a spiteful Cockchafer, who sat grinning at her from a sunflower growing near.

"I don't care" sang Spinnikin, "I'm very fond of play, and I'll have it while I can get it; and as for the rest, let the future take care of itself. There is always plenty of food in the larder for me!"

"I daresay you are happy enough now," said the Cockchafer, "because it is May, and the sun shines, and the flowers are all open. But winter is coming; oh yes! winter is coming, and the cold weather and the rain. What will you

co then ?"

"What I do now," answered Spinnikin tartly, for she did not relish his rude observations. "Curl myself under a leaf to be sure!"

"Ah, ha! but there will be no leaves for you then," laughed he, "nothing but bare branches, ha, ha! Miss Spinnikin!"

Spinnikin was very angry and rather uncomfortable; but as she did not know how to answer him, she turned her back on him and

went away.

Alas for Spinnikin! her happiest days seemed to be over, and her ill fortune to commence from that date. First of all, her indulgent mother met her death in a terribly violent and sudden manner, for she was chumped up by a voracious donkey, with the green plant she had made her home, and consequently the larder was full no longer. Spinnikin who never took pains with anything, constructed her nets in such a gobblestitch" manner, manner, that everything was not "fish" that came into them. Big Bluebottles buzzed over them and under them, and little flies crept through them; but neither

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