THE POEMS IN THIS VOLUME, SELECTED FROM WORKS PUBLISHED

BY FIELDS, OSGOOD & CO., ARE USED BY THEIR PERMISSION.

OUR POETICAL FAVORITES.

The Voiceless.

E count the broken lyres that rest

WE

Where the sweet wailing singers slumber, But o'er their silent sister's breast

The wild-flowers who will stoop to number? A few can touch the magic string,

And noisy fame is proud to win them;

Alas for those who never sing,

But die with all their music in them!

Nay, grieve not for the dead alone

Whose song has told their hearts' sad story;
Weep for the voiceless, who have known
The cross without the crown of glory!
Not where Leucadian breezes sweep

O'er Sappho's memory-haunted billow,
But where the glistening night-dews weep
O'er nameless sorrow's churchyard pillow.

O hearts that break and give no sign
Save-whitening lip and fading tresses,
Till Death pours out his cordial wine,
Slow-dropped from Misery's crushing presses!
If singing breath or echoing cord

To every hidden pang were given,
What endless melodies were poured,
As sad as earth, as sweet as heaven!

OLIVER W. HOLMES.

The Songs of Our Fathers.

66 Sing aloud

Old songs, the precious music of the heart."

ING them

SING

the upon sunny hills, When days are long and bright, And the blue gleam of shining rills

Is loveliest to the sight.

Sing them along the misty moor,

Where ancient hunters roved;

And swell them through the torrent's roarThe songs our fathers loved.

The songs their souls rejoiced to hear,

When harps were in the hall,

And each proud note made lance and spear Thrill on the bannered wall;

The songs that through our valleys green,

Sent on from age to age,

Like his own river's voice, have been

The peasant's heritage.

The reaper sings them when the vale

Is filled with plumy sheaves;

The woodman, by the starlight pale

Cheered homeward through the leaves:

And unto them the glancing oars

A joyous measure keep,

Where the dark rocks that crest our shores Dash back the foaming deep.

So let it be !- -a light they shed
O'er each old fount and grove,

A memory of the gentle dead,
A lingering spell of love.

THE DAY IS DONE.

Murmuring the names of mighty men,
They bid our streams roll on;

And link high thoughts to every glen
Where valiant deeds were done.

Teach them your children round the hearth,
When evening fires burn clear,
And in the fields of harvest mirth,

And on the hills of deer:

So shall each unforgotten word,

When far those loved ones roam,
Call back the heart which once it stirred
To childhood's holy home.

The green woods of their native land
Shall whisper in the strain;
The voices of their household band
Shall sweetly speak again;
The heathery heights in vision rise,
Where like the stag they roved ;-
Sing to your sons those melodies,
The songs your fathers loved.

MRS. FELICIA HEMANS.

The Day is Done.

'HE day is done, and the darkness

THE

Falls from the wing of Night,

As a feather is wafted downward
From an eagle in his flight.

I see the lights of the village

Gleam through the rain and the mist; And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me, That my soul cannot resist ;

3

A feeling of sadness and longing,
That is not akin to pain,
And resembles sorrow only

As the mist resembles the rain.

Come,read to me some poem,
Some simple and heartfelt lay,
That shall soothe this restless feeling,
And banish the thoughts of day.

Not from the grand old masters,
Not from the bards sublime,
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridors of time.

For, like strains of martial music,
Their mighty thoughts suggest
Life's endless toil and endeavor;
And to-night I long for rest.

Read from some humbler poet,

Whose songs gushed from his heart, As showers from the clouds of summer, Or tears from the eyelids start;

Who, through long days of labor,
And nights devoid of ease,
Still heard in his soul the music
Of wonderful melodies.

Such songs have power to quiet
The restless pulse of care,
And come like the benediction
That follows after prayer.

Then read from the treasured volume

The poem of thy choice;

And lend to the rhyme of the poet

The beauty of thy voice.