As if, like God, it all things saw,
It calmly repeats those words of awe :

“Forever-never!

Never-forever!”

In that mansion used to be
Free-hearted Hospitality ;
His great fires up the chimney roared ;
The stranger feasted at his board ;
But, like the skeleton at the feast,
That warning time-piece never ceased :

“Forever-never !

Never-forever !"

There groups of merry children played ;
There youths and maidens, dreaming, strayed
O precious hours! O golden prime
And affluence of love and time!
Even as a miser counts his gold
Those hours the ancient time-piece told :

“ Forever-never !

Never - forever !"

From that chamber, clothed in white,
The bride came forth on her wedding-night!
There, in that silent room below.
The dead lay in his shroud of snow !
And in the hush that followed the prayer,
Was heard the old clock on the stair :

“Forever-never!

Never-forever!”

All are scattered now and fled,
Some are married, some are dead;
And when I ask, with throbs of pain,
Ah! when shall they all meet again
As in the days long since gone by ?
The ancient time-piece makes reply :

“ Forever-never!

Never--forever!”

Never, here, forever there,
Where all parting, pain and care,
And death and time shall disappear !
Forever there, but never here !
The horologe of Eternity
Sayeth this incessantly :

“ Forever-never!

Never-forever!”

TWILIGHT.
The twilight is sad and cloudy,

The wind blows wild and free,
And, like the wings of sea-birds,

Flash the wild caps of the sea.

But in the fisherman's cottage

There shines a ruddier light, And a little face at the window

Peers out into the night.

Close, close it is pressed to the window,

As if those childish eyes Were looking into the darkness,

To see some form arise.

And a woman's waving shadow

Is passing to and fro, Now rising to the ceiling,

Now bowing and bending low.

What tale do the roaring ocean,

And the night-wind bleak and wild, As they beat at the crazy casement,

Tell to that little child ?

And why do the roaring ocean,

And the night-wind wild and bleak, As they beat at the heart of the mother,

Drive the colour from her cheek ?

RESIGNATION.
There is no flock, however watched and tendeel,

But one dead lamb is there!
There is no fireside, howsoe'er defended,

But has one vacant chair!
The air is full of farewells to the dying

And mournings for the dead;
The heart of Rachel, for her children crying,

Will not be comforted !
Let us be patient! These severe afflictions

Not from the ground arise,
But oftentimes celestial benedictions

Assume this dark disguise.
We see but dimly through the mists and vapours

Amid these earthly damps,
What seem to us but sad funereal tapers,

May be heaven's distant lamps.
There is no Death! What seems so is transition ;

This life of mortal breath
Is but a suburb of the life Elysian,

Whose portal we call Death.
She is not dead, the child of our affection,

But gode unto that school
Where she no longer needs our poor protection,

And Christ himself doth rule.
In that great cloister's stillness and seclusion

By guardian angels led,
Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution,

She lives, whom we call dead.
Day after day, we think what she is doing

In those bright realms of air ;
Year after year, her tender steps pursuing,

Behold her grown more fair.
Thus do we walk with her, and keep unbroken

The bond which Nature gives,
Thinking that our remembrance, though unspoken,
May reach her where she lives.

Not as a child shall we again behold her,

For when, with raptures wild,
In our embraces we again enfold her,

She will not be a child;
But a fair maiden in her Father's mansion,

Clothed with celestial grace;
And beautiful, with all the soul's expansion,

Shall we behold her face.

And though at times impetuous with emotion

And anguish long suppressed,
The swelling heart heaves moaning like the ocean,

That cannot be at rest, -
We will be patient and assuage the feeling

We may not wholly stay ;
By silence sanctifying, not concealing,

The grief that must have way.

I add one simile from the “Address to a Child :"

By what astrology of fear or hope
Dare I to cast thy horoseope!
Like the new moon thy life appears
A little strip of silver-light,
And, widening outward into night,
The shadowy disk of future years !
And yet, upon its outer rim,
A luminous circle faint and dim,
And scarcely visible to us here,
Rounds and completes the perfect sphere.
A prophecy and intimation,
A pale and feeble adumbration,
Of the great world of light that lies
Beyond all human destinies !

The concluding extract has a stronger recommendation than any other that I can give; it is Mrs. Browning's favourite among the poems of Longfellow :

THE ARROW AND THE SONG.
I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow in its flight.
I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth I knew not where;
For who has sight so keen and strong
That it can follow the flight of song ?
Long, long afterwards, in an oak
I found the arrow still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,

I found again in the heart of a friend. I venture to add an anecdote new to the English public.

Professor Longfellow's residence at Cambridge, a picturesque old wooden house, has belonging to it the proudest historical associations of which America can boast: it was the head-quarters of Washington. One night the poet chanced to look out of his window, and saw by the vague starlight a figure riding slowly past the mansion. The face could not be distinguished; but the tall erect person, the cocked hat, the traditional costume, the often-described white horse, all were present. Slowly he paced before the house and then returned, and then again passed by, after which neither horse nor rider were seen or heard of.

Could it really be Washington ? or was it some frolic-masquerader assuming his honoured form ? For my part I hold firmly to the ghostly side of the story ; so did my informant, also a poet and an American, and as worthy to behold the spectre of the illustrious warrior as Professor Longfellow himself. I can hardly say more.