THE BOYS.

"THE boys are coming home to-morrow!"

"THE

Thus our rural hostess said:

Whilst Lou and I shot flitting glances,

Full of vague, unspoken dread.

Had we hither come for quiet,
Hither fled the city's noise,
But to change it for the tumult
Of those horrid country-boys?

Waking one with wild hallooing
Early every summer day;
Shooting robins, tossing kittens,
Frightening the wrens away:

Stumbling over trailing flounces,

Thumbing volumes gold and blue;

Clamoring for sugared dainties,

Tracking earth the passage through.

These and other kindred trials

Fancied we with woful sigh:

"Those boys, those horrid boys, to-morrow!" Sadly whispered Lou and I.

I wrote those lines one happy summer;
To-day I smile to read them o'er,
Remembering how full of terror

We watched all day the opening door.

They came- the boys!" Six feet in stature,
Graceful, easy, polished men;

I vowed to Lou, behind my knitting,
To trust no mother's words again.

For boyhood is a thing immortal
To every mother's heart and eye;
And sons are boys to her forever,
Change as they may to you and I.

To her, no line comes sharply marking
Whither or when their childhood went;
Nor when the eyeglass upward turning,
Levelled at last their downward bent.

Now by the window, still and sunny,
Warmed by the rich October glow,
The dear old lady waits and watches,
Just as she waited years ago.

For Lou and I are now her daughters-
We married" those two country-boys,"
In spite of all our sad forebodings

About their awkward ways, and noise.

Lou springs up to meet a footfall;
I list no more for coming feet:
Mother and I are waiting longer
For steps on Beulah's golden street.

But when she blesses Lou's beloved,
And seals it with a tender kiss,
I know that loving words go upward,
Words to another world than this.

Alway she speaks in gentle fashion
About "my boys"—she always will;
Though one is gray, and one has vanished
Beyond the touch of time or ill.

ONE

THE TWO MAIDENS.

NE came with light and laughing air, And cheek like opening blossom; Bright gems were twined amid her hair,

And glittered on her bosom;

And pearls and costly bracelets deck
Her round, white arms, and lovely neck.

Like summer's sky, with stars bedight,
The jewelled robe around her,
And dazzling as the noontide light
The radiant zone that bound her;
And pride and joy were in her eye,
And mortals bowed as she passed by.

Another came- o'er her mild face
A pensive shade was stealing;
Yet there no grief of earth we trace,
But that deep, holy feeling,

Which mourns the heart should ever stray

From the pure fount of Truth away.

Around her brow, as snowdrop fair,
The glossy tresses cluster,

Nor pearl nor ornament was there,
Save the meek spirit's lustre ;

And faith and hope beamed from her eye,
And angels bowed as she passed by.

W

WHERE ARE THE DEAD?

HERE are the mighty ones of ages past, Who o'er the world their inspiration castWhose memories stir our spirits like a blast?

Where are the dead?

Where are old empire's sinews snapped and gone? Where is the Persian? Mede? Assyrian?

Where are the kings of Egypt? Babylon?

Where are the dead?

Where are the mighty ones of Greece? Where be The men of Sparta and Thermopyla?

The conquering Macedonian, where is he?

Where are the dead?

Where are Rome's founders? Where her chiefest son, Before whose name the whole known world bowed down Whose conquering arm chased the retreating sun? Where are the dead?

Where's the bard-warrior king of Albion's state,
A pattern for earth's sons to emulate.

The truly, nobly, wisely, goodly great?

Where are the dead?

Where is Gaul's hero, who aspired to be

A second Cæsar in his mastery —

To whom earth's crowned ones trembling bent the knee? Where are the dead?

Where is Columbia's son, her darling child,
Upon whose birth virtue and freedom smiled –
The Western star, bright, pure, and undefiled?
Where are the dead?

Where are the sons of song, the soul-inspired-
The bard of Greece, whose muse (of heaven acquired)
With admiration ages past has fired—

The classic dead?

Greater than all

an earthly sun enshrined Where is the king of bards? where shall we find The Swan of Avon-monarch of the mind

The mighty dead?

Did they all die when did their bodies die,
Like the brute dead passing forever by?
Then, wherefore was their intellect so high –
The mighty dead?

Why was it not confined to earthly sphere-
To earthly wants? If it must perish here,
Why did they languish for a bliss more dear-
The blessed dead?

There are no dead! The forms, indeed, did die,
That cased the ethereal beings now on high:
'Tis but the outward covering is thrown by:
This is the dead!

The spirits of the lost, of whom we sing,
Have perished not; they have but taken wing-
Changing an earthly for a heavenly spring:

There are the dead!

Thus is all nature perfect.

Harmony

Pervades the whole, by His all-wise decree
With whom are those, to vast infinity,

We misname dead.

FITZ-JAMES AND RODERICK DHU.

HE chief in silence strode before,

THE

And reached that torrent's sounding shore. And here his course the chieftain stayed, Threw down his target and his plaid, And to the lowland warrior said: "Bold Saxon! to his promise just,

Vich Alpine has discharged his trust.

This murderous chief, this ruthless man,

This head of a rebellious clan,

Hath led thee safe through watch and ward,
Far past Clan-Alpine's outmost guard.
Now, man to man, and steel to steel,

A chieftain's vengeance thou shalt feel.
See, here all vantageless I stand,
Armed like thyself, with single brand;
For this is Coilantogle ford,

And thou must keep thee with thy sword."

The Saxon paused: "I ne'er delayed,
When foeman bade me draw my blade;
Nay, more, brave chief, I vowed thy death:
Yet sure thy fair and generous faith,