T may not generally be known, yet so it is, that New Year's Day in the Garden varies each year, but is established by one sure sign—the blooming of the Lilac. When this takes place it is the custom of the inhabitants of the Garden to celebrate their New Year's Day. In the year when this happened which I am about to tell, the Lilac was later than usual, and there was great impatience felt at its slowness. Some of the younger ones, in fact, had serious doubts whether it would come to flower at all, and that they agreed would be a calamity, but the older ones bade them wait, for the time certainly would come. The old Buttonwood tree that stood in the corner of the Garden, and who was said to be the oldest inhabitant, grew very tiresome, for he counted up on his branches the number of years that he had seen the Lilac blow, and declared twenty times a day, as if he had not said it at all, that he had never known the bush to be so tardy. But on the night before the twentieth of May there was a plenteous shower; the next morning the sun rose splendidly upon the fresh earth, and the Lilac sent its strong perfume all over the Garden. It was unanimously agreed that New Year's Day had come at last, and that there should be an unusual celebration of it.

Now listen and you shall hear how the day was celebrated. It was divided into two parts; the first part was the morning, and was occupied after the manner of the inhabitants of the Garden in giving and receiving calls.

Owing to the slowness of the Lilac, many of the fair ones were not so elegantly dressed as they had hoped to be and were quite mortified; but the shower in the night had freshened them and taken away much of their faded appearance, so that none but the most fastidious of their visitors could detect any failing. The Garden walks were quite lively with such of the callers as were obliged to walk, while those that kept their wings, and so could fly, were moving in the air in every direction. The Bee, in his shining yellow coat, was rushing about making a great to do and acting as if no one were of so much importance. He made his first call upon the Rose, who was dressed in a charming robe of a blush-colour, and who received a great deal of attention.

"The compliments of the Lilac to you, my dear Miss," said he, bustling in. "I am a business character; have fifty calls to make and so have commenced early, as you see. What a disgraceful thing it was for the Lilac to be so unpunctual. Really I lost all patience with it. Prompt is my word. 'Improve each shining hour,' you know, my dear Miss, as the poet somewhere says, so I bid you good-morning," and the corpulent fellow in his yellow coat buzzed graciously to the Rose and hurried off to pay his respects to the next on his list.

As he went out, in came the Butterfly and the Moth, who made their calls together. The Moth was clad in grey, and the Butterfly liked that, because it set off his own brilliant colours so well.

"Bon jour, mademoiselle!" said the Butterfly, who always spoke in a foreign tongue when there was no need for it, and then he continued in his own, for he was not very perfect in the foreign tongue after all. "How charming you look this morning! What shall we do to the Lilac for denying us so long the sight of your beauty? I say, Moth, we shall have to attend to that fellow." The Moth, who remained in a corner merely bowed and smiled; he was not so brilliant as his companion, and besides was always in a state of anxiety about his coat, which was liable to be rubbed.

"Oh, Mr. Butterfly," said the Rose, "the Lilac is not to blame, and the day is all the more charming for being a little later."

"It is not the day that is so charming," said the Butterfly with a smirk. "But we have a few calls yet to make—seventy-five or a hundred, say. Come, Moth. Au revoir, Mademoiselle," and they fluttered off. "Did you see her blush, Moth, when I said that about the day not being so charming?" said the Butterfly. "That's what they like. Halloa! there goes that simpleton of a Humming-Bird. He thinks he's got the gayest coat in the Garden. What a conceited fellow!"

He said this loud enough for the Humming-Bird to hear, but that graceful creature took no notice of it. He also was out, but he made only one call, and that was to the Honeysuckle, for they were betrothed. Of course it never would do to say what they whispered to each other.

The Spring Crocus also kept open house, though she was so old that the others said it was all affectation. But she dressed herself in a yellow dress, which, however, did not make her look any younger. She had one caller. It was the Grasshopper, who was clad in his major's uniform. He came along the Garden walk that led to the Crocus in a very formal fashion, taking step with great precision, for he went exactly the same distance at each spring, and halted the same length of time between the jumps. The last spring—for he had calculated it exactly—landed him by the Crocus. The Crocus, who had watched him coming, was highly flattered though rather flustered. It was the first call she had received that day, and she had even feared she might not receive any.

"Your most obedient, madam," said the Grasshopper, lifting his elbow.

"Yes, a very warm day," said the Crocus, not quite at her ease.

"The Lilac is later than usual," continued the Grasshopper.

"Oh, yes, the Lilac, yes," said the Dowager Crocus, "quite so,—the Lilac, oh, yes! it is certainly very wrong. You are looking uncommonly well, Major," and she began to recover her composure and to look less heated.

"Thank you, madam," said the Grasshopper, raising his elbow again, "and I must say that I have never seen you looking better, and, if I may be allowed to say it, younger."

"Oh, la!" exclaimed the Dowager, quite confusedly and getting into a heat again.

"Do you find your company agreeable this morning?" asked the Grasshopper, to change the subject. He referred to the calls she was supposed to have received, but the Crocus thought he referred to himself, for she was still a little off her balance. She was just thinking how she could say something witty, when the Grasshopper added—

"You have had a number of calls, I presume?"

"Oh, yes! a great many. I am quite tired out," said she, though she ought not to have said so, for it was not true, and besides, it might be construed into a piece of rudeness. But the Grasshopper knew she had had none though he did not say so. He had nothing more to say, however, and he bade her good morning, and jumped by measurement down the Garden walk.

This was the first year that the Pansy had received calls and she was quite excited. She was very prettily pressed in a purple bodice with white skirt and yellow slippers. "Some one is coming!" she exclaimed to her mother, who was not far off. "I can hear a step on the Garden walk." "Be composed," said her mother, "Is your bodice smooth?" She felt of it and it was. The Red Ant and the Black Ant had come in company. The Red Ant is a clerk and the Black Ant is his uncle and an undertaker. They both entered at once and were graciously received. The Red Ant is so methodical and so used to system, that he had arranged beforehand with his uncle precisely what they should say and in what order. So the Black Ant advanced and said quite soberly:

"This is a very lovely day," and the Red Ant immediately added—

"The Lilac is much later than usual this year."

"Isn't it!" said the Pansy very eagerly. "I declare I thought it never would come out. Mother told me over and over again not to be so impatient but I did get so vexed!"

"It makes very little difference with us," said the Red Ant whose turn it now was; "every thing is arranged in the Hill so perfectly that nothing can put us out. We each of us carry fifty grains of sand a day."

"Oh, how severe it must be for you!" said the Pansy. "I don't believe I ever could live so systematically. It is so nice just to enjoy the air and the sun without thinking much about it. Don't you ever get a holiday?"

"It is my turn, you know," whispered the Undertaker to his nephew, and the Red Ant was so systematic that he did not answer the question, for he had forgotten to allow for it in his calculation. So the Black Ant next said—

"It makes no difference to me either. In my profession, though we cannot of course be quite so systematic as my nephew here, yet we make it a point to be at our post, rain or shine. Nephew, it must be time for us to be going."

"Yes," said the Red Ant, "it is exactly time. We allow five minutes for each call and ten minutes between each place. Good-morning!" and they marched off and said exactly the same thing at the next place.

The Pansy thought it was not quite so interesting as she expected, though it was pretty good fun, but soon she had a call from the Dragon-Fly, and that was worth while. So the morning went by, and was fully occupied with giving and receiving calls. Every one professed to have had a very good time, though the Earthworm to be sure had not succeeded in making a single call, he moved so slowly. The Bee was through long before noon, and boasted of it. "Prompt is my word," said he, "I made fifty calls, at an average of fifteen calls an hour."

That was the way they celebrated New Year's morning.