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old Ellicott City, where her ancestors lived. It was
stated that only Quaker patience and determination
could have hewn habitations for an entire colony, from
so rocky and uncompromising a region; yet the wild
beauty of the site was a lure, and the swift fall of
the river’s course offered commercial advantages, utilized
be mills and factories, erected much more than a
hundred years ago, which made the small city important
and even wealthy.

Mary E. Thomas brought us a few verses upon
“Spring Cleaning”, a topic of general interest now, -

“I wish we could open our lives every year
As we do our houses in spring,
And clean them of sorrow and trouble and fear
With the brush of a bird-like wing.
I wish we could straighten the rooms afresh
And air them and make them sweet –
The pain from the heart, and the thorns from the flesh,
And the stones from under the feet.
Clear out the rubbish and throw it away,
Leaving but this behind –
A habit of practicing day by day
The religion of being kind.”

Fanny B. Snowden told of the friendly restitution
in 1914 by Russia to France, of a bell weighing 3 tons.

She also asked how many present expected to attend
the coming conference of Friends at Cape May. Only
a few appeared to be sure of going, though others
expressed a desire to do so. No one knew just
what entertainment was to be found at $8.00 per week
but judging by experience, at former gatherings of
this kind, accommodations will be satisfactory.

Elma Chandlee gave several short poems
appropriate to the season, the first a fervent prayer
to “Sweet June” to delay her departure, the second
was the very original conceit of a little girl –

“A child stopped on her way to say –
There’s something always seems to me
To be the queerest thing –
Why does the foolish tree put on
Its warm clothes in the spring?
And then when autumn weather comes,
And chilly breezes blow,
Why does it stand out there, all bare
To shiver in the snow?”