Lovely Heart

Heart

" The greatest treasures are those invisible to the eye but found by the heart."

" Love is missing someone whenever you're apart, but somehow feeling warm inside because you're close in heart."
 

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" One of the hardest things in life is having words in your heart that you can't utter." James Earl Jones

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" Follow your heart, but be quiet for a while first. Ask questions, then feel the answer. Learn to trust your heart." Unknown

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" When you smiled you had my undivided attention. When you laughed you had my urge to laugh with you. When you cried you had my urge to hold you. When you said you loved me, you had my heart forever." Unknown

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" The heart has reasons that reason does not understand." Jacques Benigne Bossuel

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" Love is not written on paper, for paper can be erased. Nor is it etched on stone, for stone can be broken. But it is inscribed on a heart and there it shall remain forever." Unknown

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" I would rather have eyes that cannot see; ears that cannot hear; lips that cannot speak, than a heart that cannot love." Robert Tizon

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" The greatest treasures are those invisible to the eye but found by the heart." Unknown

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" Love is missing someone whenever you're apart, but somehow feeling warm inside because you're close in heart." Kay Knudsen

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" Love is of all passions the strongest, for it attacks simultaneously the head, the heart and the senses." Lao Tzu

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" There are many things in life that will catch your eye, but only a few will catch your heart...pursue those." Michael Nolan

" Few are those who see with their own eyes and feel with their own hearts." Albert Einstein

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" Maybe I could have loved you better. Maybe you should have loved me more. Maybe our hearts were just next in line. Maybe everything breaks sometime." Jewel

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" That for which we find words is something already dead in our hearts. There is always a kind of contempt in the act of speaking." Friedrich Nietzsche

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" There is always music amongst the trees in the garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it." Minnie Aumonier

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" Some people come into our lives and quickly go. Some stay for awhile and leave footprints on our hearts. And we are never, ever the same." Unknown

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" You must enshrine in your hearts the spiritual urge towards light and love, Wisdom and Bliss!" Sri Sathya Sai Baba

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" Truer words were never spoken -" Ah, but true words leave hearts broken! Truth is only for the wise - Lovers ought to stick to lies." Unknown

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" Sometimes we make love with our eyes. Sometimes we make love with our hands. Sometimes we make love with our bodies. Always we make love with our hearts." Unknown

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" If you love someone, put their name in a circle; because hearts can be broken, but circles never end." Unknown

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" Love is like a friendship caught on fire. In the beginning a flame, very pretty, often hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. As love grows older, our hearts mature and our love becomes as coals, deep-burning and unquenchable." Bruce Lee

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" No man dies for what he knows to be true. Men die for what they want to be true, for what some terror in their hearts tells them is not true." santiz Oscar Wilde

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" We must move from asking God to take care of the things that are breaking our hearts, to praying about the things that are breaking His heart." Margaret Gibb

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" Two lives, two hearts joined together in friendship united forever in love." Unknown

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" Down in their hearts, wise men know this truth: the only way to help yourself is to help others." Elbert Hubbard

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" No words are necessary between two loving hearts." Unknown

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" A Hug Is Two Hearts Wrapped In Arms." Unknown

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" All great things must first wear terrifying and monstrous masks in order to inscribe themselves on the hearts of humanity." Friedrich Nietzsche

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" We take a risk when we open our hearts because the truth is, if we open our hearts, we will get hurt. You can’t open your heart and not have some hurt because you’re in a human experience. Even if it’s the love of your life and you have many wonderful, deepening, growing, powerful years together, it’s a human experience and that person will pass over. Love takes courage. Be courageous." wolfdyke Mary Manin Morrissey

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" The real problem is in the hearts and minds of men. It is easier to denature plutonium than to denature the evil spirit of man." Albert Einstein

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" Though dreams can be deceiving, like faces are to hearts, they serve for sweet relieving, when fantasy and reality lie too far apart." Unknown

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" Memories are the treasures that we keep locked deep within the storehouse of our souls, to keep our hearts warm when we are lonely." Becky Aligada

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" I am your friend and my love for you goes deep. There is nothing I can give you which you have not got, But there is much, very much, that, while I cannot give it, you can take. No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in today. Take heaven! No peace lies in the future which is not hidden in this present little instant. Take peace! The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it, yet within our reach, is joy." santiz Fra Giovanni Giocondo

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" One must learn to be a sponge if one wants to be loved by hearts that overflow." santiz Friedrich Nietzsche

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" Don't be reckless with other people's hearts, don't put up with those who are reckless with yours." Mary Schmich

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" Blessed are the hearts that can bend; they shall never be broken." Albert Camus

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" May those who love us, love us; and those who don't love us, may God turn their hearts; and if He doesn't turn their hearts, may he turn their ankles so we'll know them by their limping." Irish Blessings

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" Brains are like hearts - they go where they are appreciated." Robert S. McNamara

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" Kind hearts are the gardens, Kind thoughts are the roots, Kind words are the flowers, Kind deeds are the fruits, Take care of your garden And keep out the weeds, Fill it with sunshine Kind words and kind deeds." Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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" Before we set our hearts too much upon anything, let us examine how happy they are, who already possess it." François de la Rochefoucauld

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" Having thus chosen our course, without guile and with pure purpose, let us renew our trust in God, and go forward without fear and with manly hearts." Abraham Lincoln

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" The more connections you and your lover make, not just between your bodies, but between your minds, your hearts, and your souls, the more you will strengthen the fabric of your relationship, and the more real moments you will experience together." Barbara De Angelis

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" You always feel better when you sing. Music touches people's hearts. You know, it doesn't go through your mental capacity, it just moves you and it will let you cry. It's worth it doing a show and when you touch a crowd and move yourself at the same." Jewel

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" Where we love is home, home that our feet may leave, but not our hearts." Oliver Wendell Holmes

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" Young men's love then lies not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes." William Shakespeare

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" Let my soul smile through my heart and my heart smile through my eyes, that I may scatter rich smiles in sad hearts." Paramahansa Yogananda

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" Distance never separates two hearts that really care, for our memories span the miles and in seconds we are there. But whenever I start feeling sad cuz I miss you I remind myself how lucky I am to have someone so special to miss." steph8987

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" It appears that nature has hid at the bottom of our hearts talents and abilities unknown to us. It is only the passions that have the power of bringing them to light, and sometimes give us views more true and more perfect than art could possibly do." François de la Rochefoucauld

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" The human heart is like a ship on a stormy sea driven about by winds blowing from all four corners of heaven." Martin Luther

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" Those who don't know how to weep with their whole heart, don't know how to laugh either." Golda Meir

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" It is my heart That makes my songs, not I." Sara Teasdale

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" People have to learn sometimes not only how much the heart, but how much the head, can bear." Maria Mitchell

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" If I create from the heart, nearly everything works; if from the head, almost nothing." Marc Chagall

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" It is not the brains that matter most, but that which guides them -- the character, the heart, generous qualities, progressive ideas." Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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" If I create from the heart, nearly everything works; if from the head, almost nothing." Marc Chagall

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" People are governed by the head; a kind heart is of little value in chess." Nicholas Chamford

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" It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." Antoine de Saint-Exupery

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" What I wish to show when I paint is the way I see things with my eyes and in my heart." Raoul Dufy

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" There are no elements so diverse that they cannot be joined in the heart of a man." Jean Giraudoux

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" I am all for people having their heart in the right place; but the right place for a heart is not inside the head." Katharine Whitehorn

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" It is in the heart that the values lie. I wish I could make him understand that a loving heart is riches, and riches enough, and that without it intellect is poverty." Mark Twain, Eve's Diary

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" The head learns new things, but the heart forever more practices old experiences." Henry Ward Beecher

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" A kind heart is a fountain of gladness making everything in its vicinity freshen into smiles." Washington Irving

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" It is not the level of prosperity that makes for happiness but the kinship of heart to heart and the way we look at the world. Both attitudes are within our power . . . a man is happy so long as he chooses to be happy, and no one can stop him." Alexandr Solzhenitsyn

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" The mind forgets but the heart always remembers." Anon

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" Life is short and we have never too much time for gladdening the hearts of those who are traveling the dark journey with us. Oh be swift to love, make haste to be kind." Henri-Frederic Amiel

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" My heart is singing for joy this morning! A miracle has happened! The light of understanding has shone upon my little pupil's mind, and behold, all things are changed!" Anne Sullivan

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" You can't make a heart love somebody, You can lead a heart to love, But you can't make it fall." Unknown

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" One must be aware that one is continually being tested in what one wishes most in order to make clear whether one's heart is on earth or in heaven." Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan

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" The heart to conceive, the understanding to direct, and the hand to execute." Junius

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" The Path that leadeth on is lighted by one fire -- the light of daring burning in the heart. The more one dares, the more he shall obtain." Helena Petrova Blavatsky

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" True creativity quite simply starts with balancing your emotions and activating the power of the heart. Through practicing emotional management from the heart, you tap into the highest form of creativity possible--recreating your perceptions of reality." Doc Childre

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" Today, see if you can stretch your heart and expand your love so that it touches not only those to whom you can give it easily, but also those who need it so much." Daphine Rose Kingma

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" If I keep a green bough in my heart, then the singing bird will come." Chinese proverb

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" Worry affects the circulation, the heart, the glands, the whole nervous system, and profoundly affects heart action." Dr. Charles H. Mayo

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" When pure sincerity forms within, it is outwardly realized in other people's hearts." Lao Tzu, 6th century B.C.

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" To understand the heart and mind of a person, look not at what he has already achieved, but at what he aspires to." Kahlil Gibran

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" Where ever you go, go with all your heart." Confucius

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" Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart ... Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside, awakens." Carl Jung

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" The heart is forever making the head its fool." François de La Rochefoucauld

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" Courtesies of a small and trivial character are the ones which strike deepest in the gratefully and appreciating heart." Henry Clay (1777-1852)

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Flowers

Flowers

A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproductive structure found in flowering plants (plants of the division Magnoliophyta, also called angiosperms). The biological function of a flower is to effect reproduction, usually by providing a mechanism for the union of sperm with eggs. Flowers may facilitate outcrossing (fusion of sperm and eggs from different individuals in a population) or allow selfing (fusion of sperm and egg from the same flower). Some flowers produce diaspores without fertilization (parthenocarpy). Flowers contain sporangia and are the site where gametophytes develop. Flowers give rise to fruit and seeds. Many flowers have evolved to be attractive to animals, so as to cause them to be vectors for the transfer of pollen.
In addition to facilitating the reproduction of flowering plants, flowers have long been admired and used by humans to beautify their environment, and also as objects of romance, ritual, religion, medicine and as a source of food.

FLOWER STORIES

GRANDMOTHER'S GARDEN

Stately and prim grew the hollyhocks tall,
In grandmother's garden against the wall;
Fairest of flower-duennas were they,
Keeping good watch through the long summer day.
Close by the was the sunshiny corner, where
The foxgloves swayed in the balmy air,
And nodded across to the larkspurs blue,
And the pleasant nook where the columbines grew.
There were cinnamon-roses, and, low at their feet,
The shadowy cluster of day-lilies sweet,
And mignonette modest, and pensive heart's-ease,
And boy's love, and candytuft, sweet in the breeze.

And, first every morn by the sun to be kissed,
Grew, all in a tangle, fair love-in-a-mist,
With bachelor's-buttons, and sweet williams gay,
And spice pinks for neighbours just over the way;
There were sweet peas coquettish, most festive of flowers,
And four-o'clocks sturdy to mark off the hours,
And frail morning-glories that laughed in the light
At the phlox and verbenas, pink, purple, and white.
Ah! the days were so bright, and so sweet was the air,
And in grandmother's garden all life looked so fair!

–Dorothy Grey.

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THE ARBUTUS

FROM UNDER THE PINES

The postman rang the bell earlier than usual that morning. To Phyllis he handed a good-sized box well wrapped in brown paper.
"It's from Auntie Nan!" cried Phyllis, in frantic haste to cut the string. "It's from Auntie Nan! I know her writing! What can it be?"
By this time the string was unfastened, and the brown paper torn off. Phyllis slipped the cover.
"Oh!" she said, as though her breath were quite taken away.
"Oh!" and her pink little face was buried in the box. "Oh, where did you come from?"
The pink, pink bloom of the arbutus smiled up at her, and the delicious fragrance filled the whole room.
There were great masses of the small, fragrant blossoms. Phyllis happily lifted them from their box, and filled a big glass bowl with them. This she placed on the table in the dining-room. Their sweetness greeted all as they entered the room.
In the bottom of the box was tucked a note from Auntie Nan. It was directed to Phyllis. Would you like to read the letter?

"Dear little Spring Blossom:–Here are some of your little sisters come to keep your birthday with you. I know you will be glad to welcome them, especially when I tell you that I found them huddled snugly under some brown leaves and half covered with snow.
"'We are Phyllis's birthday blossoms,' they seemed to say, as I brushed away the leaves and the snow, and they looked bravely out.
"So I gathered every one I could find; and I send them to you, little girl, because they make me think of a certain sweet little pink and white baby your mamma sent for me to come and see just eight years ago.
"Are you not glad that you, too, are a little Mayflower, and that your birthday comes on the very first day?
"You know, your friend, the poet, Whittier, calls these little wild wood flowers which I am sending 'The first sweet smiles of May'?
"Did I say that these flowers grew out on the hill among the pines where you played last summer? They tell me that the arbutus is particularly fond of pine-woods and light sandy soil.
"Do you not call them brave to peep forth so very early? But, you see, they were really very well protected by their own heart-shaped leaves, which kept alive and green all winter just for the sake of those blossoms which were to come.
"I think it is no wonder that the Pilgrims, after that first hard, hard winter, were so happy to welcome this little messenger of spring. They called it the Mayflower. We people of New England still call it the Mayflower, but by others it is called the trailing arbutus. Sometimes, too, I have heard it called 'mountain laurel.'
"I have no doubt but that the story of the Pilgrims is quite true, for the flower still grows in its lovely sweetness all about the hills of Plymouth.
"Are you not glad that I call them your flowers, Phyllis? Are you not glad that to us, you, too, are one of 'the first sweet smiles of May?'
"Wishing that all Mayflowers may bloom more and more sweetly as the seasons go, I am,

"Your loving

"Auntie Nan."

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THE TRANSPLANTED FLOWER

"Every time a good child dies, one of God's angels comes down to earth and takes the dead child in his arms, then spreads his large white wings and flies over all the spots which the child best loved and plucks a whole handful of flowers, which he carries up to the Almighty, that they may bloom in still greater loveliness in heaven than they did upon earth; and the Almighty presses all such flowers upon His heart, but He gives a kiss to the one He prefers, and then the flower becomes endowed with a voice, and can join the choir of the blessed."
These words were spoken by one of God's angels, as he carried a dead child to heaven, and the child heard him as in a dream; and they passed over the spots in his home where the little one had played, and they passed through gardens filled with beautiful flowers.
"Which shall we take with us and transplant into the kingdom of heaven?" asked the angel.
There stood a slender, lovely rose-bush, only some wicked hand had broken the stem, so that its sprigs, loaded with half-open buds, were withering around.
"Poor rose-bush!" said the child; "let's take it, in order that it may be able to bloom above, in God's kingdom."
And the angel took it and kissed the child for its kind intention, and the little one half-opened its eyes. They plucked some of the gay, ornamental flowers, but took likewise the despised buttercup and the wild pansy.
"Now we have plenty of flowers," said the child, and the angel nodded assent; but did not yet fly upward to God. It was night, and all was quiet; they remained in the large town, and hovered over one of the narrow streets, where lay heaps of straw, ashes, and sweepings. There lay fragments of plates; pieces of plaster of Paris, rags, and old hats, and all sorts of things that had become shabby.
And amidst this heap the angel pointed to the broken fragments of a flower-pot, and to a lump of mould that had fallen out of it, and was kept together by the roots of a large, withered field-flower, which, being worthless, had been flung into the street.
"We will take it with us," said the angel, "and I will tell you why as we fly along."
And as they flew, the angel related as follows:
"In yon narrow street, a poor, sickly boy lived in a lonely cellar. He had been bed-ridden from his childhood. In his best days, he could just walk on crutches up and down the room a couple of times, but that was all. During some days in summer the sun just shone for about half an hour on the floor of the cellar, and when the poor boy sat and warmed himself in its beams, and he saw the red blood through his delicate fingers, that he held before his face, then he considered that he had been abroad that day. All he knew of the forest and its beautiful spring verdure was from the first green sprig of beech that his neighbour's son used to bring him, and he would hold it over his head, and dream that he was under the beech-trees, amid the sunshine and the carol of birds.
"One spring day the neighbour's boy brought him some field-flowers besides, and among them there happened to be one that still retained its root, and which he therefore carefully planted in a flower-pot and placed in the window near his bed. The flower was planted by a lucky hand; it throve and put forth new shoots, and blossomed every year. It became the rarest flower garden for the sick boy, and his only little treasure here on earth; he watered it, and cherished it, and took care it should profit by every sunbeam, from the first to the last, that filtered through that lonely window, and the flower became interwoven in his very dreams; for it was for him it bloomed; for him it spread its fragrance and delighted the eye, and it was to the flower he turned in the last gasp of death, when the Lord called him. He has now been a year with his heavenly Father, and for a year did the flower stand forgotten in the window, till it withered. It was therefore cast out among the sweepings in the street on the day of moving; and this is the flower, the poor faded flower, which we have added to our nosegay, because this flower gave more joy than the rarest flower in the garden of a queen."
"And how do you know all this?" asked the child, as the angel carried him up to heaven.
"I know it," said the angel, "because I myself was the little sick boy who walked on crutches; I know my own flower."
And the child opened his eyes wide, and looked full in the angel's serenely beautiful face. At the same moment they reached the kingdom of heaven, where all was joy and blessedness.
And God pressed the child to His heart, when he obtained wings like the other angel and flew hand-in-hand with him; and God pressed all the flowers to His heart, but kissed the poor withered field-flower, which then became endowed with a voice. It joined the chorus of the angels that surrounded the Almighty, where all were equally happy.
And they all sang, great and little, the good, blessed child, and the poor field-flower that lay withered and cast away among the sweepings under the rubbish of a moving day, in the narrow, dingy street.
                                                                                                     –Hans Andersen
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A CHRISTMAS ROSE

The old black pine on the mountainside cast a long dark shadow across the thin covering of snow which covered the whole mountain and even the valley below.
The cold winds blew fiercely and the old black pine waved his shaggy arms fitfully and laughed at the soft snowflakes that nestled themselves fearlessly among his long needles.
"Ho! Ho!" laughed the old black pine. "Ho! Ho! winter has come, but I do not fear him. The flowers have gone, but I shall brave the winter storms. I shall laugh at them as I have done for countless seasons."
Then a fiercer blast of wind struck the pine-tree and bent his tall head so low that he saw a little plant growing at his very feet. It was a hardy little mountain rose, and it had two buds already half-open. The pine-tree also heard a weary little sigh.
"Why do you sigh and fret?" asked the pine-tree, his shaggy arms spread to protect the plant.
"Alas!" said the rose-plant, "the other plants are long since asleep. I wish I might bloom when the others do. My buds are beautiful, but who is there to admire them?
"What fun it would be to blossom with the blue-eyed gentian or the lovely goldenrod. They would have admired my blossoms. But now no one cares. I see no use in blooming at all. Oh, dear! Oh, dear!"
"Ho! Ho!" laughed the old black pine. "Ho! Ho! What nonsense you talk, little friend. The snowflakes and I will admire you. Do not be a grumbler.
"Do you not remember that you are a little Christmas rose? You are named for the Christ Child. You should be more happy and contented than other plants.
"Be brave, little rose. The snow is growing deeper about you. Push up and keep your head above the drifts. Care well for your precious buds, that they may open into perfect blossoms.
"Keep up heart, little rose. You do not know yet for what purpose you were left to bloom so late. But be sure of this: we were all made for some wise purpose. When the time comes, we shall know."
Then shaggy pine fingers of the old tree touched the rose with a gentle caress as he lifted his tall head once more to the winds. He did not speak again, but the little rose nestling at his feet, thought long of the old pine's wise advice.
"Perhaps he is right," she murmured to herself. "Perhaps I had better do as he said. All the other flowers are dead. If I was made for a wise purpose I shall not long be forgotten."
So the mountain rose lifted her leaves bravely. She sighed no longer. She took good care of her beautiful buds, and watched them as day by day they grew.
It was the day before Christmas when the buds opened lovely and white and perfect. The old pine saw them, and bowed his head to admire the blossoms. He shook all over as he laughed down on the blossoms peeping up through the snow.
"Ho! Ho!" laughed the dark old pine. "Who is unhappy now?" and the blossoms smiled back contentedly.
That day two little children wandered hand in hand up the mountainside. Their father was the woodcutter who lived in the tiny hut below.
Their mother was the pale, sick woman who lay in the tiny hut and answered her children by neither look nor word.
By their mother's bed sat the father, speechless with grief. About the room moved the kind neighbour with tears in her eyes.
"Our mother is very ill," whispered the children. The kind woman shook her head sadly.
"I fear," she said, "that your mother will not live till sunset."
Then, sobbing softly, the two little children stole out of the door. Hand in hand they walked on, scarce knowing where they went. At last they came to the foot of the black old pine.
"Come," said the boy. "The old pine does not care for our grief. Let us go to the valley. There we will find people with kind hearts. They will care for us."
The girl opened her soft, sad eyes and stared at the boy.
"Poor boy!" she said. "Your grief has made you forget. There is always the Christ Child who cares. To-morrow is His birthday."
Then she spied the Christmas roses blossoming so perfectly in the snow.
"Let us take these roses," said the children, "and go to the church. We will pray that our mother may yet live."
The old, white-haired pastor met the children at the church door. Together they entered and prayed. The roses, nodding in the little girl's hand, seemed now to understand why they had bloomed so late.
That night the mother's fever turned. The mother began to grow better. There was joy in the little hut.
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THE BUTTERCUP

IN THE PASTURE

"Don't tread on me," cried a flower voice at Phyllis's feet.
"Who are you?" asked the little girl.
"I belong to the crowfoot family," said a buttercup, holding her head up very proudly. "Some folks call us the gold of the meadow."
"Some folks call you weeds," said Phyllis. "My brother Jack says that no one but little girls care for buttercups. He says that even cows won't eat you."
"No, indeed," said the buttercup. "I shouldn't like to be eaten by cows. I am glad of the bitter acid in my stem. It protects me. I have no doubt it has saved my head many a time."
"You stand very proudly upon your hairy stem. And so you may stand, for I shall not touch you. If I did, the juice from your stems would probably make my hands smart and itch and burn.
"But you are pretty," Phyllis went on. "How satiny your five yellow petals are, and how erect your stem is! I should judge it to be about three feet high."
The buttercup raised her head a little higher.
"Did you grow from a seed?" Phyllis asked.
"No, from a bulb, but some buttercups grow from seeds, I think. I am the early buttercup. Later in the season will come the fall buttercup. It will be very much like me, save that it will not be so tall nor so large as I. I am sorry that you do not like me as well as you do the wild rose. I really have not treated you as badly as she."
"Well," Phyllis said, "you do seem to be very friendly, and you seem to grow on cheerily without the least encouragement."
"Yes, it's a way we weeds have a way of doing," said the buttercup, serenely.
"Nothing any one can say or do seems to make the least difference to you. I have seen old Boss pass you by with just a single sniff many a time."
"That, too, is because I'm a weed. I'm a sort of plant tramp. I can live almost anywhere. I do not need encouragement nor praise. I am not useful, and yet I am happy."
"I do think you are pretty," Phyllis said. "But I am on my way to the pond, where Jack has been building a raft. He has promised me a ride."
"Good-bye," said the buttercup. "When you have time, look up the story of how buttercups happened to grow in the world."

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THE GOLD OF THE MEADOW

Do you believe there is a bag of gold hidden away at the end of the rainbow? Do you think if you could only get there before the rainbow fades you would surely find the gold?
Well, don't you ever run very far to find the end of the rainbow. Shall I tell you why?
Well, then, the bag of gold is no longer there. It is much nearer home, and I can tell you the exact spot to find it! Go down in the meadow where the buttercups grow, and there you will find the gold which was once hidden at the end of the rainbow.
Long ago, just as you have so often heard, the bag of gold lay at the farther end of the rainbow. But, long ago, somebody found it. Have you never heard about it?
Many, many people looked for the gold, and they failed to find it. At last they came to say that no one could ever get it.
It seems almost sad, then, to find out that at last the bag was certainly found by a miserly old man.
This old man was selfish. He was cross. He was unpleasant, and likewise unhappy.
When he found the gold, he wished no one to know of it. He feared that some one might need some of his precious gold. So he decided to hide his wealth in the earth.
So one dark night, when black clouds scurried across the sky and not a star was in sight, the old miser went to bury his gold. He slung the big bag over his shoulder and crept along the dark meadow where the grass was thick and tall. It was, in fact, the self-same meadow in which the fairies danced, but this the old man did not know.
Now the fairies are always good and wise and loving. They do not like selfishness, and they love to do kindnesses for others. But fairies are also sometimes full of mischief. Listen, and I will tell you what one fairy did!
As the old man crept slyly along, a fairy spied him. With a laugh she ripped a hole in the bag with a sharp grass blade. Of this the old man knew nothing.
One by one the gold pieces slipped down among the grasses. Little by little the bag grew lighter, but the old man did not notice, so eager was he to reach the wood before any needy one saw him.
His bag was empty before he reached the wood, but all amid the grasses shone the gold which he had dropped.
"Let us put it on stems, that all may see," said the fairies. "Let the fairy gold be free alike to rich and poor!"
So all night long the fairies worked. When morning came the sun shone down on the meadow which was bright with gold, each piece set on a sturdy stem of its own.
"You may call them buttercups, if you wish," laughed the mischievous fairy, "but they are fairy gold just the same!"

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