"If there is anything I detest," said she, scornfully, "it is old furniture, especially second-hand beds. If that is the best you have to offer a prospective bride, Mr. Bluebird, I will bid you good-day," and the haughty young creature prettily fluttered her wings as if about to fly off and leave him.

"Do not go," he pleaded; "if this house does not please you I have others to offer," and Miss Bluebird, moved apparently by his tender strains, sweetly said tru-al-ly and condescended to fly down and enter the box.

was scarcely a minute ere she reappeared, and , flying at once to her favorite branch in the maple tree, called to him to follow. A scrap of paper, woven into his nest by the Purple Martin the past season, fluttered to the ground as she emerged from the box, and while the pair exchanged vows of love and constancy up in the maple tree, I picked it up and saw, not without marveling at the sagacity of Mr. Bluebird, who probably had dragged it into sight, a heart faintly drawn in red ink, and below it the words: