Ere she hasten'd to the spirit-land; There my Mary blest me with her hand! I have come to see that grave once more, I have come to see that grave once more. Angel, said he sadly, I am old! Earthly hope no longer hath a morrow; Now, why I sit here thou hast been told : In his eye another pearl of sorrow, Down it rolled! Angel, said he sadly, I am old! By the wayside, on a mossy stone, Sat the hoary pilgrim, sadly musing: By the wayside, on a mossy stone! RALPH HOYT. THE DAYS GONE BY. O THE days gone by! O the days gone by! The apples in the orchard, and the pathway through the rye; The chirrup of the robin, and the whistle of the quail As he piped across the meadows sweet as any nightingale ; When the bloom was on the clover, and the blue was in the sky, And my happy heart brimmed over-in the days gone by. In the days gone by, when my naked feet were tripped By the honeysuckle tangles where the water-lilies dipped, And the ripples of the river lipped the moss along the brink, Where the placid-eyed and lazy-footed cattle came to drink, And the tilting snipe stood fearless of the truant's wayward cry And the splashing of the swimmer, in the days gone by. O the days gone by! O the days gone by! The music of the laughing lip, the lustre of the eye; The childish faith in fairies, and Aladdin's magic ring The simple, soul-reposing, glad belief in every thing. For life was like a story, holding neither sob nor sigh, In the golden, olden glory of the days gone by. SORROW AND JOY. J. W. RILEY, TELL me what is sorrow? It is a garden-bed. Which in that garden grows. I plucked it in my youth so royal red, Tell me what is sorrow? It is an endless sea. I dived deep down, they gave it up to me, And now I look and long for it in vain. Tell me what is sorrow? It is a gloomy cage. Opening the door, for I was never sage, It bit me-bit, I let it go again, And now I look and long for it in vain. Tell me when my sorrow shall ended, ended be? And when return the joy that long since fled? Not till the garden-bed Restores the rose; not till the endless sea Restores the pearl; not till the gloomy cage Restores the bird; not, poor, old man, till age Which sorrow is itself, is youth again— And so I look and long for it in vain! RICHARD HENRY STODDard. GRAY HAIR IN YOUTH. WHAT does youth with silvered crown? Ashes white, not snow, he bears,- EDITH M. THOMAS. ICHABOD. So fallen! so lost! the light withdrawn The glory from his gray hairs gone Revile him not,-the tempter hath A snare for all; And pitying tears, not scorn and wrath Oh! dumb is passion's story rage, When he who might Have lighted up and led his age, Scorn! Would the angels laugh, to mark Let not the land, once proud of him, Insuit him now; Nor brand with deeper shame his dim, But let its humbled sons, instead, From sea to lake, A long lament, as for the dead, In sadness make. |