the flowers in the big garden were all talking about the new rose that had just come to stay with them. "moss rose is very beautiful," remarked peony to the hollyhock; "you know she was just an ordinary kind of a rose until one evening, when the queen of the fairies didn't know just where to go for the night, she leaned over and said to her, 'will you sleep in the heart of a rose?' and the queen said of course she would, and in the morning the fairy queen in return for the hospitality gave her a delicate veil of moss, and from that time she was called the 'moss rose.'"

"indeed!" replied the hollyhock. "how lovely; i wish a fairy would come through our garden."

"perhaps one will," said the peony. "at any rate the rose has always been the queen of flowers, and now that we have a new rose perhaps the queen of the fairies may visit our garden."

the hollyhock smiled. "tell me more," she said. "do you know any more stories about red roses, or white roses, or pink roses, or yellow roses?"

"yes, indeed," replied the peony, "for i love roses; everybody does. you know the old romans loved them just as much as we, and they somehow managed to make them bloom in the winter time. when they wanted to talk over matters that they did not want repeated abroad they hung a rose from the ceiling over the table, and all the conversation was called 'sub rosa,' 'under the rose.' the reason for this was because cupid once gave a rose to harpocrates, the god of silence, and that was what the old romans were thinking about when they hung the rose over the table and talked secrets."

"how interesting!" said the hollyhock. "where did you learn all of these wonderful things?"

"oh," replied the peony. "i learned it from a poet who used to walk among the flowers. the daughter of the owner of this garden would sit and listen to him while he told her stories and legends about roses; always roses, for her name was rose, you know."

"tell me more," said the hollyhock, and all the other flowers bent near, too, for they had heard a little of what the peony had told and were anxious to hear more of what the poet knew.

"he said, i remember," continued the peony, "that the old name of syria meant the 'land of roses' and many varieties came from there, and one, the 'rose of jericho,' was the most wonderful, for there is an old legend that it grew in the desert in places where the virgin mary touched her feet when flying into egypt with the infant jesus; and they say, too, it will always blossom at christmas time."

"how beautiful!" cried all the flowers. "poets are like us—for their poetry is the perfume of their souls."

little bo peep had lost her sheep,

and didn't know where to find them;

but she turned them all to automobiles,

and now she rides behind them.