& ALFRED TENNYSON. MOAN, MOAN, YE DYING GALES. OAN, moan, ye dying gales! Is not so sad as life; Or with such sorrow rife. Nor kills such lovely flowers; When dark misfortune lowers. Hush! hush! thou trembling lyre, And thou, mellifluous lute, And all his music mute. RETROSPECTION EARS, idle tears, I know not what they mean, Tears from the depth of some divine despair Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes, In looking on the happy autumn fields, And thinking of the days that are no more. Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail, That brings our friends up from the under world Sad as the last which reddens over one That sinks with all we love below the vergeSo sad, so fresh, the days that are no more. Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns The earliest pipe of half-awakened birds To dying ears, when unto dying eyes The casement slowly grows a glimmering square ; So sad, so strange, the days that are no more. Dear as remembered kisses after death, And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned On lips that are for others; deep as love, Deep as first love, and wild with all regretO death in life, the days that are no more. ALFRED TENNYSON. PERISHED. AVE after wave of greenness rolling down From mountain top to base, a whispering so! Of affluent leaves through which the view less breeze Murmurs mysteriously. And towering up amid the lesser threag, Smitten by lightning from a summer sky, Is pitiless to slay. Ah, wayward soul, hedged in and clothed about, MARY LOUISE RITTER. THE FEMALE CONVICT. HE shrank from all, and her silent in od Made her wish only for solitude; Her eye sought the ground as it could not brook, For innermost shame, on another's look; And the cheerings of comfort teil on her ear She still was young, and she had been fair; They were sailing over the salt sea-foam, She could not weep, and she could not pray, She called me once to her sleeping-place, I heard the reaper's harvest strain; There stood on the hills the green pine-tree, But I stopped, methought, by mine own sweet home. The Bible lay open upon his knee, But he closed the book to welcome me. He led me next where my mother lay, And give it my father, and tell him my praver, U the deck a coffin lay; Next day Thsed it up, and like a dirge The heavy gale swept over the surge; LOSSES. PON the white sea-sand There sat a pilgrim bana, Telling the losses that their lives had known. And the strong tides went out with weary moan. One spake, with quivering lip, With all his household to the deep gone down; For a fair face, long ago Lost in the darker depths of a great town. There were who mourned their youth For its brave hopes and memories ever green; Turned an eye that would not rest, For far-off hills whereon its joy had been. Some talked of vanished gold, Some of proud honors told, Some spake of friends that were their trust no more; Should make, like the brute, such a desolate end, And one of a green grave Beside a foreign wave, That made him sit so lonely on the shore. But when their tales were done, A stranger, seeming from all sorrow free: But mine is heavier yet; For a believing heart hath gone from me." "Alas!" these pilgrims said, "For the living and the dead For fortune's cruelty, for love's sure cross, But, however it came to thee, Thine, stranger, is life's last and heaviest loss."' And depart from the light without leaving a friend! Though a pauper, he's one whom his Maker yet THOMAS Noel. FRANCES BROWN. THE PAUPER'S DRIVE. ON THE FRONTIER. HAT! Robbed the mail at midnight! We'll trail them down, you bet! We'll bring them to the halter; I'm sheriff of Yuba yet. Get out those mustangs, hearties, and long before set of sun We'll trail them down to their refuge, and justice shall yet be done. It's pleasant, this rude experience; life has a rugged zest 'HERE'S a grim one-horse hearse in a jolly Here on the plains and mountains, far to the open round trot To the churchyard a pauper is going, I wot; The road it is rough, and the hearse has no springs; And hark to the dirge which the mad driver sings : "Rattle his bones over the stones! He's only a pauper whom nobody owns!" O, where are the mourners? Alas! there are none; He's only a pauper whom nobody owns!" west: Look at those snow-capped summits-waves of an endless sea; Look at yon billowed prairie, boundless as grand and free. Ah! we have found our quarry! yonder within the bush! Empty your carbines at them, then follow me with a rush! Down with the desperadoes! Ours is the cause of right! Though they should slash like demons, still we must gain the fight! Pretty hot work, McGregor, but we have gained the day. What? Have we lost their leader? Can he have sneaked away? There he goes in the chaparral! He'll reach it now in a bound! Give me that rifle, Parker! I'll bring him down to the ground. 'There, I knew I could drop him; that little piece of lead Sped straight on to its duty. The last of the gang is dead. He was a handsome fellow, plucky and fearless, too; Pity such men are devils, preying on those more true. What have found in his pockets? Papers? Let's take a look. "Ceorge Walgrave" stamped on the cover? Why, that is my brother's book; The deeds and the papers also, and letters received from me; He must have met these demons. Been murdered and robbed, you see. And I have been his avenger! It is years since last we met. We loved each other dearly, and Walgraves never forget. If my voice is broken, excuse me. Somehow it confines my breath Let me look on the face of that demon who dogged poor George to his death! Good God! It is he; my brother! killed by my own strong hand! He is no bandit leader! This is no robber band! What a mad, murderous blunder! Friends, who thought they were foes. Seven men dead on the prairie, and seven homes flooded with woes. And to think that I should have done it! When ere many suns should set, I hoped to embrace my brother-and this is the way we've met! He with his dead eyes gazing up to the distant sky, And I his murderer, standing, living and unharmed, by! Well, his fate is the best one! Mine, to behold his corse Haunting my life forever; doomed to a vain remorse. How shall I bear its shadows? How could this strange thing be? O my brother and playmate! Would I had died for thee! Pardon my weak emotion. Bury them here my friends; Here, where the green plumed willow over the prairie bends. One more tragedy finished in the romance of strife, Passing like sombre shadows over this frontier life. J. EDGAR JONES. PRINCE'S FEATHER SAT at work one summer day, It was breezy August weather, And my little boy ran in from his play, With a bright red prince's feather. "Make me a cocked ha', mother dear," He cried, "and put this in it; Dick and Charlie are coming here, And I want it done in a minute!” It was but one little boy I had, And I dearly loved to please him ; When such a trifle would make him glad, Be sure I did not tease him. I dropped my work with a merry heart, And Willie and I together We made the cocked-hat gay and smart, With its plume of prince's feather. I set it firmly on his bonny head, I kissed his cheeks that were rosy red, Ar 1 his mouth where smiles were glancing: Then off he ran, the beautiful boy! My eager eyes ran after, And my heart brimmed over with loving joy, At the ring of his happy laughter. Back to their work my fingers flew, I was sewing a frock for Willie- They were like the blue of the August skies, I never guessed when he ran from me, I sat at my work, and I sang aloud Nor ever dreamed it was Wiliie's shroud I folded the frock away complete, And Charlie and Dick were coming. Some one spoke as I reached the gate, (He was Charlie's grown-up brother), "Wait!" he said in a whisper, "wait! We must break it to his mother!" I asked no more. They brought him home— His curls all tangled and wet with fɔam, I combed the curls, though my eyes were im And the little frock I made for him Somewhere, carefully laid away, It is only dust that was once a flower, In sun or shower, that will have such power MARY E. BRADLEY. THE LAST HOURS OF LITTLE PAUL AUL had never risen from his little bed. He lay there, listening to the noises in the street, quite tranquilly; not caring much how the time went, but watching everything about him with observing eyes. only trouble was, the swift and rapid river. He felt forced, sometimes, to try to stop it-to stem it with his childish hands, or choke its way with sand-and when he saw it coming on, resistless, he cried out! But a word from Florence, who was always at his side, restored him to himself; and leaning his poor head upon her breast, he told Floy of his dream, and smiled. When day began to dawn again, he watched for the sun: and when its cheerful light began to sparkle in the room, he pictured to himself-pictured! he sawthe high church-towers rising up into the morning sky, the town reviving, waking, starting into life once more, the river glistening as it rolled (but rolling fast as ever), and the country bright with dew. Familiar sounds and cries came by degrees into the street below; the servants in the house were roused and busy; faces looked in at the door, and voices asked his attendants softly how he was. Paul always answered for himself, "I am better. I am a great deal better, thank you! Tell papa so!" By little and little he got tired of the bustle of the day, the noise of carriages and carts, people passing and repassing; and would fall asleep or be troubled with a restless and uneasy sense again-the child could hardly tell whether this were in his sleeping or his waking moments-of that rushing river. "Why, will it never stop, Floy?" he would sometimes ask her. "It is bearing me away, I think!” But Floy could always soothe and reassure him ; and it was his daily delight to make her lay her head down on his pillow, and take some rest. “You are always watching me, Floy. Let me watch you, now!" They would prop him up with cushions in a corner of his bed, and there he would recline the while she lay beside him; bending forward oftentimes to kiss her, and whispering to those who were near that she was tired, and how she had sat up so many nights beside him. Thus, the flush of the day, in its heat and light, would gradually decline; and again the golden water would be dancing on the wall. When the sunbeams struck into his room through the rustling blinds, and quivered on the opposite wall He was visited by as many as three grave doctorslike golden water, he knew that evening was coming they used to assemble down stairs and come up toon, and that the sky was red and beautiful. As the re-gether-and the room was so quiet, and Paul was so flection died away, and the gloom went creeping up the wall, he watched it deepen, deepen, deepen into night. Then he thought how the long streets were dotted with lamps, and how the peaceful stars were shining overhead. His fancy had a strange tendency to wander to the river, which he knew was flowing through the great city; and now he thought how black it was, and how deep it would look, reflecting the hosts of stars, and more than all, how steadily it rolled away to meet the sea. As it grew later in the night, and footsteps in the street became so rare that he could hear them coming, count them as they passed, and lose them in the hollow distance, he would lie and watch the many-colored ring about the candle, and wait patiently for day. His observant of them (though he never asked of anybody what they said), that he even knew the difference in the sound of their watches. But his interest centered in Sir Parker Peps, who always took his seat on the side of the bed. For Paul had heard them say long ago, that that gentleman had been with his mamma when she clasped Florence in her arms and died. And he cold not forget it now. He liked him for it. He was no1 afraid. Late one evening Paul closed his eyes and fell asleep. When he awoke, the sun was high, and the broad day was clear and warm. He lay a little, looking at the windows, which were open, and the curtains rustling in the air, and waving to and fro : then he said, "Floy, is it to-morrow? Is she come?" |