Mother! How many delightful associations cluster around that word! The innocent smiles of infancy, the gambols of boyhood, and the happiest hours of riper years! When my heart aches and my limbs are weary travelling the thorny path of life, I sit down on some mossy stone, and closing my eyes on real scenes, send my spirit back to the days of early life; I feel afresh my infant joys and sorrows, till my spirit recovers its tone, and is willing to pursue its journey. But in all these reminiscences my mother rises; if I seat myself upon my cushion, it is at her side; if I sing, it is to her ear; if I walk the walls or the meadows, my little hand is in my mother's, and my little feet keep company with hers; when my heart bounds with its best joy, it is because at the performance of some task, or the recitation of some verses, I receive a present from her hand. There is no velvet so soft as a mother's lap, no rose so lovely as her smile, no path so flowery as that imprinted with her footsteps. [ Bishop Thomson ]