Abounding from its sources like a river Which through the dim lawns streams eternally! Virtue might then uplift her crest on high, Spurning those myriad bonds that fret and grieve her: Then all the powers of hell would quake and quiver Before the ardors of her awful eye. Alas for man with all his high desires, And inward promptings fading day by day! High-titled honor pants while it expires, And clay-born glory turns again tɔ clay. Low instincts last: our great resolves pass by Like winds whose loftiest pæan ends but in a sigh. CHARLES DICKENS. And slyly he traileth along the ground, And his leaves he gently waves, And he joyously twines and hugs around The rich mould of dead men's graves. Creeping where no life is seen, A rare old plant is the Ivy green. Whole ages have fled, and their works decayed, And nations scattered been; But the stout old Ivy shall never fade From its hale and hearty green. The brave old plant in its lonely days Shall fatten upon the past; For the stateliest building man can raise Is the Ivy's food at last. Creeping where no life is seen, My heart is the dungeon of darkness, Where I shut them for breaking a rule: My frown is sufficient correction; I shall leave the old house in the autumn, To traverse its threshold no more; Ah! how I shall sigh for the dear ones, That meet me each morn at the door! I shall miss the "good-nights" and kisses, [glee, And the gush of their innocent The group on the green, and the flowers That are brought every morning for me. I shall miss them at morn and at even, Their song in the school and the street; I shall miss the low hum of their voices, And the tread of their delicate feet. I have banished the rule and the When the lessons of life are all ended, rod; I have taught them the goodness of knowledge, They have taught me the goodness of God; And death says The school is dis missed!" May the little ones gather around me To bid me 66 good-night and be kissed! MARY LOWE DICKINSON. IF WE HAD BUT A DAY. WE should fill the hours with the We should guide our wayward or sweetest things, If we had but a day; wearied wills By the clearest light; We should drink alone at the purest We should keep our eyes on the springs In our upward way; heavenly hills, If they lay in sight; We should love with a lifetime's love We should trample the pride and the in an hour, If the hours were few; discontent Beneath our feet; We should rest, not for dreams, but We should take whatever a good for fresher power To be and to do. God sent, With a trust complete. We should waste no moments in We should be from our clamorous weak regret, If the day were but one; selves set free, To work or to pray, If what we remember and what we And to be what the Father would theme, immemorial Wheel, wheel through the sunshine, There must be odors round the pine, Wheel, wheel through the shadow; There must be balm of breathing kine, Somewhere down in the meadow. Must I choose? Then anchor me there Beyond the beckoning poplars, where The larch is snooding her flowery hair Among the thickest hazels of the With wreaths of morning shadow. brake shake Perchance some nightingale doth [song; His feathers, and the air is full of In those old days when I was young and strong, Beside the nursery. Along my life my length I lay, I fill to-morrow and yesterday, I am warm with the suns that have long since set, And rih as Chaucer's speech, and I am warm with the summers that are fair as Spenser's dream. HOME, WOunded. STAY wherever you will, not yet. And like one who dreams and dozes Softly afloat on a sunny sea, Two worlds are whispering over me, And there blows a wind of roses From the backward shore to the shore before, From the shore before to the back ward shore, And like two clouds that meet and pour The nevermore with the evermore |