Birds in the cherry-trees, Bees in the clover; Who half so gay as these All the world over?
Violets among the grass, Roses regretting How soon the summer 'll pass,-- Next year forgetting.
Buds sighing in their sleep, "Summer, pray grant us Youth, that its bloom will keep Fragrance to haunt us!"
Rivulets that shine and sing, Sunbeams abetting,-- No more remembering Their frozen fretting.
Sweet music in the wind, Sun in the showers; All these we're sure to find In summer hours.
"Please, Mr. Mate has _that_ cloud a silver lining?"
The question was asked by little Kate Vale, the daughter of an emigrant, who, with her mother, was following her father, who had gone before to New York. Katie was a quiet, gentle little child, who gave trouble to no one. She had borne the suffering of seasickness at the beginning of the voyage so patiently, and now took the rough sea-fare so thankfully, that she had made a fast friend of Tom Bolton, the mate. Bolton had a warm, kindly heart, and one of the children whom he had left in England was just the age of Katie; this inclined him all the more to show her kindness. Katie often had a piece of Bolton's sea-biscuit; he told her tales which he called "long yarns," and sometimes in rough weather he would wrap his thick jacket around her, to keep the chill from her thinly-clad form. Katie was not at all afraid of Bolton, or "Mr. Mate," as she called him, and she took hold of his hard brown hand as she asked the question,--
Bolton glanced up at a very black, lowering cloud, which seemed to blot the sun quite out of that part of the sky.
"Why do you ask me, Kate?" said the sailor.
"Because mother often says that every cloud has a silver lining, and that one looks as if it had none."
"None that we can see," he replied; "for the cloud is right atween us and the sun. If we could look at the upper part, where the bright beams fall, we should see yon black cloud like a great mass of silvery mother-o'-pearl, just like those that you yesterday called shining mountains of snow."
Katie turned round, and raising her eyes, watched for some minutes the gloomy cloud. It was slowly moving towards the west, and as it did so, the sun behind it began to edge all its dark outline with brightness.