412 THE EVERGREEN OF OUR FEELINGS.

bility to nature, art, and love. Thou, as well as I, may indeed weep less frequently than formerly, at the theatre or at concerts; but give us a truly excellent piece, and we cannot suppress the emotion it excites. Youth is like unbleached wax, which melts under feeble sun-beams, while that which has been whitened is scarcely warned by them. The mature or aged man avoids those tears which youth invites; because in him they flow too hot, and dry too slowly.

Select a man of my age, and of my heart, with my life-long want of highland scenery, and conduct him to the valley of the Rhine! Bring him to that long, attractive, sea-like river, flowing between vine-clad hills on either side, as between two regions of enchantment, reflecting only scenes of pleasure, creating islands for the sake of clasping them in its arms; let also a reflection of the setting sun glow upon its waters; and surely youth would again be mirrored in the old man, and that still ocean of infinity, which in the true and highest heaven permits us to look down.

In

Memory, wit, fancy, acuteness, cannot grow young again in old age; but the heart can. order to be convinced of this, we need only remember how the hearts of poets have glowed in the autumn and winter seasons of life. He who in old age can do without love, never in his youth possessed the right sort, over which years have no power. During winter, it is the withered branch

es, not the living germs, that become encrusted with ice. The loving heart will indeed often bashfully conceal a portion of its warmth behind children and grandchildren; so that last love is perhaps as coy as the first. But if an aged eye, full of soul, is upraised, gleaming with memories of its spring-time, is there anything in that to excite ridicule? Even if it were silently moistened, partly through gladness, and partly through a feeling of the past, would it not be excusable? Might not an aged hand presume to press a young hand, merely to signify thereby, I, too, was once in Arcadia, and within me Arcadia still remains? In the better sort of men love is an interior sentiment, born in the soul; why should it not continue with the soul to the end? It is a part of the attraction of tender and elevated love that its consecrated hours leave in the heart a gentle, continuous, distinct influence; just as, sometimes, upon a heavenly spring-evening, fragrance, exhaled from warm blossoms in the surrounding country penetrates every street of a city that has no gardens.

I would exhort men to spare every true affection, and not to ridicule the overflowings of a happy heart with more license than they would the effusions of a sorrowing one. For the youth of the soul is everlasting, and eternity is youth.

OUR SECRET DRAWER.

TH

HERE is a secret drawer in every heart, Wherein we lay our treasures, one by one; Each dear remembrance of the buried past, Each cherished relic of the time that's gone.

The old delights of childhood, long ago;

The things we loved because we knew them best; The first discovered primrose in our path;

The cuckoo's earliest note; the robin's nest ;

The merry haymakings around our home;

Our rambles in the summer woods and lanes;

The story told beside the winter fire,

While the wind moaned across the window panes ;

The golden dreams we dreamt in after years,

Those magic visions of our young romance: The sunny nooks, the fountains and the flowers, Gilding the fairy landscape of our trance;

The link which bound us, later still, to one
Who fills a corner in our life to-day,

Without whose love we dare not dream how dark
The rest would seem, if it were gone away;

The song that thrilled our souls with very joy;
The gentle word that unexpected came;

The gift we prized because the thought was kind; The thousand, thousand things that have no name;

All these, in some far hidden corner lie,

Within the mystery of that secret drawer,

Whose magic springs though stranger hands may touch, Yet none may gaze upon its guarded store.

ANONYMOUS.

"How seldom, friend, a great, good man inherits Honor, or wealth, with all his worth and pains." "For shame, dear friend, renounce this canting strain. What wouldst thou that the great, good man obtain ? Place, title, salary, a gilded chain?

Or throne on corpses which his sword has slain?
Goodness and greatness are not means, but ends.
Hath he not always treasures, always friends,
The great, good man? Three treasures, love, and light,
And calm thoughts, regular as infant's breath;

And three true friends, more sure than day and night, -
Himself, his Maker, and the angel Death."

COLERIDGE.

THE GOLDEN WEDDING.

The German custom of observing a festival called the Silver Wedding, on the twenty-fifth anniversary of marriage, and a Golden Wedding on the fiftieth anniversary, have now become familiar to us by their frequent observance in this country. The following description of such an anniversary in Sweden is from the graceful pen of Fredrika Bremer, in her work entitled "The Neighbors."

HERE was a patriarch and wife, and only to see that ancient, venerable couple made the heart rejoice. Tranquillity was upon their brows, cheerful wisdom on their lips, and in their glance one read love and peace. For above half a century this ancient couple have inhabited the same house and the same rooms. There they were married, and there they are soon to celebrate their golden nuptials. The rooms are unchanged, the furniture the same it has been for fifty years; but everything is clean, comfortable, and friendly, as in a one-year-old dwelling, though much more simple than the houses of our time. I know not