Here, clad in burning robes, are laid
Life's blossomed joys, untimely shed;
And here those cherished forms have strayed
We miss awhile, and call them dead.
What wizard fills the maddening glass?
What soil the enchanted clusters grew,
That buried passions wake and pass
In beaded drops of fiery dew?

Nay, take the cup of blood-red wine,

Our hearts can boast a warmer glow, Filled from a vintage more divine, —

Calmed, but not chilled by winter's snow!

To-night the palest wave we sip

Rich as the priceless draught shall be

That wet the bride of Cana's lip,

The wedding wine of Galilee !

WHAT WE ALL THINK.

THAT age was older once than now,
In spite of locks untimely shed,
Or silvered on the youthful brow;

That babes make love and children wed.

That sunshine had a heavenly glow,

Which faded with those "good old days"

When winters came with deeper snow,

And autumns with a softer haze.

That

- mother, sister, wife, or child

The "best of women " each has known.

Were schoolboys ever half so wild?

How young the grandpapas have grown!

That but for this our souls were free, And but for that our lives were blest; That in some season yet to be

Our cares will leave us time to rest.

Whene'er we groan with ache or pain,
Some common ailment of the race,
Though doctors think the matter plain,
That ours is "a peculiar case.”

That when like babes with fingers burned
We count one bitter maxim more,
Our lesson all the world has learned,
And men are wiser than before.

That when we sob o'er fancied woes,
The angels hovering overhead
Count every pitying drop that flows
And love us for the tears we shed.

That when we stand with tearless eye
And turn the beggar from our door,
They still approve us when we sigh,

“Ah, had I but one thousand more!”

Though temples crowd the crumbled brink

O'erhanging truth's eternal flow,

Their tablets bold with what we think,

Their echoes dumb to what we know ;

That one unquestioned text we read,
All doubt beyond, all fear above,
Nor crackling pile nor cursing creed

Can burn or blot it: GOD IS LOVE!

SPRING HAS COME.

INTRA MUROS.

THE sunbeams, lost for half a year,

Slant through my pane their morning rays;

For dry northwesters cold and clear,

The east blows in its thin blue haze.

And first the snowdrop's bells are seen,
Then close against the sheltering wall

The tulip's horn of dusky green,

The peony's dark unfolding ball.

The golden-chaliced crocus burns ;
The long narcissus-blades appear;
The cone-beaked hyacinth returns

To light her blue-flamed chandelier.