THE DAYS THAT ARE NO MORE Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean. Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail, Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns The casement slowly grows a glimmering square: Dear as remembered kisses after death, LET HER SLIDE Let the howlers howl, and the growlers growl, and the prowlers prowl, and the gee-gaws go it; Behind the night there is plenty of light, and things are all right and I know it. Anonymous. ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD The curfew tolls the knell of parting day, The lowing herds wind slowly o'er the lea, Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower, Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-trees' shade, The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep. The breezy call of incense-breathing morn, The swallow twitt'ring from the straw-built shed, No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed. For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn, No children run to lisp their sire's return, Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share. Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield, Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke; How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy stroke! Let not ambition mock their useful toil, Their homely joys, and destiny obscure; The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow'r. The paths of glory lead but to the grave. Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault, Can storied urn, or animated bust, Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath? Can honor's voice provoke the silent dust, Or flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of Death? Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire; But knowledge to their eyes her ample page, Chill penury repressed their noble rage, Full many a gem of purest ray serene The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear; Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the desert air. Thomas Gray, 1716-1771. LET SOMETHING GOOD BE SAID When over the fair fame of friend or foe The shadow of disgrace shall fall; instead Forget not that no fellow-being yet May fall so low but love may lift his head; No generous heart may vainly turn aside And so I charge ye, by the thorny crown, James Whitcomb Riley. HIS OLD FATHER SATISFIED Twenty years ago a discouraged young doctor in one of our large cities was visited once by his old father, who came up from a rural district to look after his boy. "Well, son," he said, "how are you getting along?" "I'm not getting along at all," was the disheartened answer. "I'm not doing a thing." The old man's countenance fell, but he spoke of courage and patience and perseverance. Later in the day he went with his son to the "Free Dispensary," where the young doctor had an unsalaried position, and where he spent an hour or more every day. The father sat by, a silent but intensely interested spectator, while twenty-five poor unfortunates received help. The doctor forgot his visitor while he bent his skilled energies to this task; but hardly had the door closed on the last patient when the old man burst forth: "I thought you told me that you were not doing anything! Why, if I had helped twenty-five people in a month as much as you have in one morning. I would thank God that my life counted for something." "There isn't any money in it, though," explained the son, somewhat abashed. "Money!" the old man shouted, still scornfully, "Money! What is money in comparison with being of use to your fellow-men? Never mind about money; you go right along at this work every day. I'll go back to the farm and gladly earn money enough to support you as long as I live-yes, and sleep soundly every night with the thought that I have helped you to help your fellow-men." Chicago Advance. THE MAN OF SCIENCE DID NOT BITE Miss Daisy Leiter has brought back from London a story about Charles Darwin: "Two English boys," said Miss Leiter, "being friends of Darwin, thought one day that they would play a joke on him. They caught a butterfly, a grasshopper, a beetle and a centipede, and out of these creatures they made a strange, composite insect. They took the centipede's body. the butterfly's wings, the grasshopper's legs and the beetle's head, and they glued them together carefully. Then, with their new bug in a box, they knocked at Darwin's door. "'We caught this bug in a field,' they said. 'Can you tell us what kind of a bug it is, sir?' |