The Lily of the Valley.
"I AM the Lily of the Vallies."
"Consider the Lilies, how they grow."
KNOW ye why this flower is holy?
Gentle thoughts doth aye impart ;
Why the Lily pale and lowly,
Graves its name upon my heart?
'Tis because my Saviour bore it; Bore this gentle name of Earth; 'Tis because He marvelled o'er it, Mark'd its beauty, gave it birth.
And forever shall the story
Treasured be in sacred lore,
How that Solomon's great glory
Vied not, with this simple flower.
Might that look but rest on me,
Fill me with its matchless grace,
Might I gaze forever on Thee,
"Till I mirror back Thy face;
Then when called from friend and brother,
Fading flowers, and passing ties;
And when Angels round shall hover,
Sent to bear me to the skies;
Jesus to Thy love, and favour,
To Thy presence then restored;
I shall bear thy image ever
In the garden of the Lord.
The Rising Eagle.
My bird, the struggle's over! Thy wings, at length unfurled, Will bear thee, noble rover, Through yon blue airy world.
Thy fearless breast has shaken
Earth's dust and dew away;
Thine eye its aim hath taken,-
Its mark, the orb of day.
Up, up, the faster, leaving
Thy rocky rest below,
A fresher strength receiving,
The lighter shalt thou go.
The clouds that hang before thee,
Thou soon shalt oversweep,
When all is brightness o'er thee,
To swim the upper deep.
Through seas of ether sailing,
Thou lofty, valiant one!
The breath of morn inhaling,
Thy course is to the sun.
The strife was all in lifting
Thy breast from earth at first,
The poising and the shifting
To balance, was the worst.
And so with us; 'tis spreading
Our pinions for the skies,
That keeps us low and dreading
The first attempt to rise.
Mammoth Cave.
ELEVEN hours we wandered in wrapt awe,
Within this world of voiceless wonderment,
And gloomy grandeur.
All is hushed as when
God spake and it was done! Before
Creation animate had lifted up on high
And sung through all His works-a God at hand!
Here is a world left tenantless, alone—
But filled with beauty silent and sublime.
Here we behold long aisles and fretted vaults,
And arches swelling high-magnificence
Beyond the reach of vision, and fair domes
Of gothic form are here, and chambers vast-
Conforming to the chaste, severer style
Of Grecian beauty.
Bearing her stars in glory. Ocean too,
Flows ebbless here, hiding the eyeless fish,
Which, fitted for their rayless pilgrimage,
Have undisputed right to revel there.
Beyond, what forms of beauty meet the gaze
Of man's intruding eye!-huge pillared halls
With a new Flora decked, munificent,
In varied form and gorgeous curves of beauty,
Instinct with grace, and of a snowy brightness,
More beauteous than the gem-bespangled walls,
In palaces of Oriental story.
Or where Serena's arbour opes to view,
The solid rock drops down to gorgeous folds,
With the luxurious grace of drapery.
Oh wondrous work of Nature! Nature's God
Alone hath fashioned thee.-He spake,
And the insensate rock wide open stood!
From the all-forming hollow of His hand,
He poured the watery flood adown thy aisles.
The mighty torrent with its thunder-tone,
Hath worn away the solid barrier now,
And written on the rocky adamant
Its own wild history, more durable,
Than aught short of the Infinite could write.
Che First Snow Fall.
THE snow had begun in the gloaming,
And busily all the night,
Had been heaping field and highway,
With a silence deep and white.
Every pine, and fir, and hemlock,
Wore ermine too dear for an earl,
And the poorest twig on the elm-tree,
Was ridged inch deep with pearl.
From sheds new roofed with Carrara,
Came Chanticlers muffled crow,
The stiff rails were softened to swans-down-
And still fluttered down the snow.
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