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They loved, but the story we can- 'Tis the wink of an eye; 't is the

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not unfold;

draught of a breath

They scorned, - but the heart of the From the blossom of health to the

haughty is cold;

They grieved, but no wail from their slumbers will come; They joyed, but the tongue of their gladness is dumb.

paleness of death,

From the gilded saloon to the bier and the shroud;

Oh! why should the spirit of mortal be proud?

MARIE R. LACOSTE.

SOMEBODY'S DARLING.

INTO a ward of the whitewashed | Back from his beautiful, blue-veined

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brow,

Brush all the wandering waves of

gold,

Cross his hands on his bosom now, Somebody's darling is still and cold.

Kiss him once for somebody's sake, Murmur a prayer soft and low; One bright curl from its fair mates take,

They were somebody's pride, you know:

Somebody's hand has rested there,Was it a mother's soft and white? And have the lips of a sister fair Been baptized in those waves of light?

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OFT have I walked these woodland SWEET winter roses, stainless as the

paths, Without the blest foreknowing That underneath the withered leaves The fairest buds were growing.

To-day the south-wind sweeps away The types of autumn's splendor, And shows the sweet arbutus flowers, Spring's children, pure and tender.

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A cross of lilies that our tears bedew, A garland of the fairest flowers that grow,

And filled with fragrance as the thought of thee,

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We lay, with loving hand, upon thy breast,

Wrapt in the calm of Death's great mystery;

with lips of Ours still to feel the pain, the unlanguaged woe,

Outvying in your beauty The pearly tints of ocean shells,Ye teach me faith and duty!

"Walk life's dark ways," ye seem to say,

"With love's divine foreknowing, That where man sees but withered leaves,

God sees sweet flowers growing."

The bitter sense of loss, the vague

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Ghost-like I paced round the haunts of my childhood.

Earth seemed a desert I was bound

to traverse,.

HESTER.

WHEN maidens such as Hester die, Their place ye may not well supply, Though ye among a thousand try, With vain endeavor.

A month or more has she been dead,
Yet cannot I by force be led
To think upon the wormy bed
And her together.

A springy motion in her gait,
A rising step, did indicate
Of pride and joy no common rate,
That flushed her spirit:

I know not by what name beside
I shall it call; if 't was not pride,
It was a joy to that allied,
She did inherit.

Her parents held the Quaker rule, Which doth the human feelings cool; But she was trained in nature's school,

Nature had blessed her.

A waking eye, a prying mind,
A heart that stirs, is hard to bind;
A hawk's keen sight ye cannot
blind,

Ye could not Hester.

My sprightly neighbor, gone before Seeking to find the old familiar To that unknown and silent shore!

faces.

Friend of my bosom, thou more than a brother,

Why wert not thou born in my father's dwelling?

So might we talk of the old familiar faces

How some they have died, and some they have left me,

And some are taken from me; all are departed,

All, all are gone, the old familiar faces!

Shall we not meet as heretofore

Some summer morning;

When from thy cheerful eyes a ray
Hath struck a bliss upon the day,--
A bliss that would not go away,
A sweet forewarning?

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Peeps out, -and if there comes a Himself he boards and lodges; both

shower of rain,

Retreats to his small

invites

domicile And feasts himself; sleeps with himself o' nights.

again. Touch but a tip of him, a horn,-'tis well,

He curls up in his sanctuary shell. He's his own landlord, his own tenant; stay

Long as he will, he dreads no quarter-day.

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LÆTITIA ELIZABETH LANDON.

SUCCESS ALONE SEEN.

Hard are life's early steps; and, but that youth

FEW know of life's beginnings-Is buoyant, confident, and strong in

men behold

The goal achieved;

when his sword

the warrior,

Flashes red triumph in the noonday

sun;

The poet, when his lyre hangs on the palm;

The statesman, when the crowd proclaim his voice,

And mould opinion on his gifted tongue:

They count not life's first steps, and never think

Upon the many miserable hours When hope deferred was sickness to the heart.

They reckon not the battle and the march,

The long privations of a wasted youth;

They never see the banner till unfurled.

What are to them the solitary nights Passed pale and anxiously by the sickly lamp,

Till the young poet wins the world at last

To listen to the music long his own? The crowd attend the statesman's fiery mind

That makes their destiny; but they do not trace

Its struggle, or its long expectancy.

hope,

Men would behold its threshold, and despair.

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