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libri-one lay to test the worth of all -to assure Christopher in his Cave whether Mr. Milnes be or be not a Poet.

THE WORTH OF HOURS.

"Believe not that your inner eye Can ever in just measure try The worth of Hours as they go by:

"For every man's weak self, alas! Makes him to see them, while they pass As through a dim of tinted glass:

"But if in earnest care you would Meie out to each its part of good, Trust rather to your after-mood.

"Those surely are not fairly spent. That leave your spirit bowed and bent In sad unrest and ill-content:

"And more-though free from seeming harm,

You rest from toil of mind or arm,
Or slow retire from pleasures charm,

"If then a painful sense comes on
Of something whoily lost and gone,
Vainly enjoped, or vainly done,-

"Of something from your being's chain Broke off, nor to be link'd again By all mere Memory can retain,-

"Upon your heart this truth may riseNothing that altogether dies Suffices Man's just destinies:

"So should we live, that every Hour May die as dies the natural flower,-A self reviving thing of power;

"That every Thought and every Deed
May hold within itself the seed
Of future good and future meed;

"Esteeming Sorrow, whose employ
Is to develope, not destroy,
Far better than a barren joy."

enough to love, yet nothing doubting that had we ever so many hearts we could give them all away among the virgin apparitions.

Ŏ if this simile do not satisfy, let us tell you that we like to look at a Volume as at a Valley-discerning not one feature of the scene distinctly, but feeling its spirit as surely as if we distinctly observed them all-so that when our dreamy eyes come to settle down upon it, every object occupies the very place we expected to find it in, and is of the very character and kind we thought it to be, only lovelier in their neighbourhood, because now all understood, and forming in themselves a little world where beauty has reduced them all into order, and order is the expression of peace!

Nay, if we must still strive to make clear our meaning, have you never sat in a boat on a lake before known to you but by name, and unwilling all at once to look steadily on what is nevertheless filling your breast with delight, kept even your hands at times over your eyes, and at others glanced stealthily around, almost as if afraid to lapse into the magical world among whose shadows you were sailing, till taking courage as it were from the glimpses of beauty that made themselves be seen whether you would or no-perhaps from some other fairy pinnace passing by meteorous with its cloud of sail- or bird floating away undisturbedly among the reeds, too happy to fly from its own bay where there was every thing to love and nothing to fear-you have at last delivered up your whole soul to the scene, and in one minute have become almost as well acquainted with its character as if you had lived for years on its banks, and have added to the domain of memory, never more to fade, a love lier vision than Imagination's self could have created in the world of

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Find a dear familiar face In each hour of Long-ago.

"Follow yon majestic train
Down the slopes of old renown,
Knightly forms without disdain,
Sainted heads without a frown;
Emperors of thought and hand
Congregate, a glorious show,
Met from every age and land
In the plains of Long-ago.

"As the heart of childhood brings
Something of eternal joy,
From its own unsounded springs,
Such as life can scarce destroy;
So, remindful of the prime,
Spirits, wandering to and fro,
Rest upon the resting time
In the peace of Long-ago.

"Youthful Hope's religious fire, When it burns no longer, leaves Ashes of impure Desire

n the altars it deceives;
But the light that fills the Past
Sheds a still diviner glow,
Ever farther it is cast

O'er the scenes of Long-ago.

"Many a growth of pain and care,
Cumbering all the present hour,
Yields, when once transplanted there,
Healthy fruit or pleasant flower;
Thoughts that hardly flourish here,
Feelings long have ceased to blow,
Breathe a native atmosphere
In the world of Long-ago.

"On that deep-retiring shore
Frequent pearls of beauty lie,
Where the passion-waves of yore
Fiercely beat and mounted high:
Sorrows that are sorrows still
Lose the bitter taste of wo;
No hing's altogether ill
In the griefs of Long-ago.

"Tombs where lonely love repines,
Ghastly tenements of tears,
Wear the look of happy shrines
Thro' the golden mist of years;
Death, to those who trust in good,
Vindicates his hardest blow:
Oh! we would not, if we could,
Wake the sleep of Long-ago.

"Tho' the doom of swift decay
Shocks the soul where life is strong,
Tho' for frailer hearts the day
Lingers sad and overlong-
Still the weight will find a leaven,
Still the spoiler's hand is slow,
While the Future has its Heaven,
And the Past its Long-ago.

season of life, for almost all other passions are then dead or dying, or the mind, no more at the mercy of a troubled heart, compares the little pleasure their gratification can ever yield now with what it could at any time long ago, and lets them rest. Envy is the worst disturber or embitterer of man's declining yearsbut it does not deserve the name of a passion-and is a disease, not of the poor in spirit—for they are blessed-but of the mean, and then they indeed are cursed. For our own parts we know Envy but us we have studied it in others-and never felt it except towards the wise and good -and then twas a longing desire to be like them, painful only when our hearts almost died within us to think that might never be, and that all our loftiest aspirations were in vain! Our envy of Genius is of a nature so noble that it knows no happiness like that of guarding from mildew the laurels on the brows of the Muses' Sons. What a dear kind soul of a critic is old Christopher North! Watering the flowers of poetry, and removing the weeds that might choke them-letting in the sunshine upon them and fencing them from the blast; proclaiming where the gardens grow, and leading boys and virgins into the pleasant alleysteaching hearts to love and eyes to see their beauty, and classifying, by the attributes it has pleased nature to bestow on the various orders, the plants of Paradise-this is our occupation-and the happiness of witnessing them all growing in the light of admiration is our reward. How many will be induced to read this volume by the specimens now selected by us in our Cave! How harmoniously they combine-rather selecting themselves--offering themselves to us by force of fine affinities-families of kindred emotions that come flocking of their own accord to our feet.

THE FLIGHT OF YOUTH.

"No, tho' all the winds that lie
In the circle of the sky

Trace him out and pray and moan,
Each in its most plaintive tone-
No, tho' Earth be split with sighs,
And all the Kings that reign

A green old age is the most loving Over Nature's mysteries

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"Youth is gone away,
Cruel, cruel Youth,

Full of gentleness and truth
Did we think him all his stay;
How had he the heart to wreak
Such a wo on us so weak,
He that was so ten ler-meek?
How could he be made to learn
To find pleasure in our pain?
Could he leave us, to return
Never again!

"Bow your heads very low,
Solemn-measured be your paces,
Gathered up in grief your faces,
Sing sad music as ye go;
In disordered handfuls strew
Strips of cypress, sprigs of rue;
In your hands be borne the bloom,
Whose long petals once and only
Look from their pale-leaved tomb
In the darkness lonely;
Let the nightshade's beaded coral
Fall in melancholy moral
Your wan brows around,
While in very scorn ye fling
The amaranth upon the ground
As an unbelieved thing;
What care we for its fair tale
Of beauties that can never fail,
Glories that can never wane?
No such blooms are on the track
He has past, who will come back
Never again!

"Alas! we know not how he went, We knew not he was going, For had our tears once found a vent, We had stayed him with their flowing. It was as an earthquake, when We awoke and found him gone, We were miserable men, We were hopeless, every one! Yes, he must have gone away In his guise of every day, In his common dress, the same Perfect face and perfect frame; For in feature, for in limb, Who could be compared to him? Firm his step, as one who knows He is free, where'er he goes, And withal as light of spring As the arrow from the string; His impassioned eye had got Fire which the sun has not; Silk to feel, and gold to see, Fell his tresses full and free, Like the morning mists that glide Soft adown the mountain's side; Most delicious twas to hear

When his voice was trilling clear,
As a silver-hearted bell,

Or to follow its low swell,
When, as dreamy winds that stray
Fainting mid Æolian chords,
Inner music seemed to play
Symphany to all his words;
In his hand was poised a spear,
Deftly poised, as to appear
Resting of its prop r will-
1 hus a merry aunter still,
A dengarlanded with bay,
Must our Youth have gone away;
Tho' we half remember now,
He had borne some little while
Something mournful in his smile-
Something serious on his brow:
Gentle heart, perhaps he knew
The cruel deed he was about to do!
Now, between us all and Him
There are rising mountains dim,
Forests of uncounted trees,
Spaces of unmeasured seas,
Think, with Him how gay of yore
We made sunshine out of shade-
Think with Him how light we bore
All the burden sorrow laid;
All went happily about Him—
How shall we toil on without Him?
How without his cheering eye
Constant strength embreathing ever?
How without Him standing by
Aiding every hard endeavour?
For when faintness or disease
Had usurped upon our knees,
If he deigned our lips to kiss
With those living lips of his,
We were lightened of our pain,
We were up and hale again-
Now, without one blessing glance
From his rose-lit countenance,
We shall die, deserted men-
And not see him, even then!
We are cold, very cold-
All our blood is drying old,
And a terrible heart-dearth
Reigns for us in heaven and earth:
Forth we stretch our chilly fingers
In poor effort to attain

Tepid embers, where still lingers
Some preserving warmth, in vain.
Oh! if Love, the Sister dear
Of Youth that we have lost.
Come not in swift pity here,
Come not, with a host

Of Affections, strong and kind,
To hold up our sinking mind;
If she will not, of her grace,
Take her Brother's holy place,
And be to us, at least a part
Of what he was, in Life and Heart,
The faintness that is on our breath
Can have no other end but Death."

We read these lines without fearing to let all their pathos fall upon our

spirits for into its depths should that pathos sink, it will find there a repose it cannot disturb, or a trouble it cannot allay. The truths they tell have been so long familiar there, that we seem to hear but our own voice again giving utterance to thoughts that for many years have lain silent, but alive in their cells-like slumberers awakened at midnight, by solemn music, lifting up their heads for a while to listen, and then laying them down to relapse into the same dreams that had possessed their sleep. But ye who are still young-yet have begun to experience how sad it is and mournful exceedingly to regret, perhaps to weep over, the passing away and the past, because that something was that never more may be-ponder ye on the strain, and lay the moral, the religious lesson it teaches within your hearts. So may the sadness sanctify-and the Spirits that God sends to minister unto us children of the dust, find you willing to be comforted, when Youth has left you, heedless if to despairfor Angel though he seem, he is not of heaven-but of heaven are they, and therefore immortal.

Now receive into your hearts, O Youths!-undivided by any commentary of ours-these three strains potent in the peace they breathe-and verily, even in this noisy world the peaceful are the strong. The first, it is true, speaks of change, decay, and trouble and the second is saddened by the melancholy which imagination often carries into the heart-but the third is elevating and ennobling-and the three, thus read as one, leave the spirit calm, and prepared to face the future in the confidence of love and

truth.

TO MY BROTHER.

"Six years, six cycles of dead hours,
Six falls of leaves, six births of flowers,
It is not that, you know full well,
That makes my laboring bosom swell,
Tis not the memory of lost Time,
Since last I heard that matin chime,
That brings to sense a sleeping sorrow,
To bid this long-left scene good-morrow:
It is the curse to feel as men,
And be not now as we were then.
The snowy down on yonder hill
Through thousand summers glistens
still,-

VOL. XLIV.

24

Yon stream will never to time surrender
Its rapid path of diamond splendour,--
Yon orb, but now who swept the East,
With train of ruby and amethyst,
Rides on, unweariedly as ever,
Those trees, I own, are somewhat higher,
O'er frowning rock, and glittering river;
The ivy round the village spire
In fuller-clustering leaf has grown,
We cannot call that cot our own-
But what has changed in this sweet glen
As we from what our hearts were then?
Say you, the glow of hope is bright,
And if it be a meteor light,
That hurtles through the thickening sky,
Tis wise to catch it ere it die?
Tell you me, tis a joy to feel
Our toil increase a fellow's weal?
That, mid these fainting, fading, bowers,
There linger still some amaranth flowers
And honest will, and honest prayer,
Will find them lurking every where?
Say on, I can but add, Amen,-
We are not now as we were then.

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Oh, Brother! when I gaze upon
When through the dense and steamy air,
These tombs of little blisses gone,
Which we with men are wont to share,
A breeze of distant youth has stole
In freshness on my fevered soul-
I feel like one who long has lain
With madness gathering in his brain,
And bursting from the strong distress,
Wakes to a terrible consciousness.
Then blame you, that my pulse beat now,
Blame you the agony on my brow?
There was, when fear was all a stranger,
Ere knowledge showed the way to danger,
When love was firm; when faith was sure,
And head and heart alike secure;
But now,... Remember you a flower
Which we with care, from sun and
shower,

It was our mother's,-loved to guard
And how we joyed in our reward,
When first we watch'd its bloom appear,
When it was old so many a year;
And how we heard, with tearful eye,
The good old gardner's prophecy,
For he was deep in nature's lore,
That that bright plant would bloom no
more ?

The flowers fell off, the stalk was gathered,

The root grew dry, the lank leaves withered,

And sad to lose its only pride,
The poor Agave sunk and died;
Our one, our only bloom is gone,
But, Brother, still we linger on.

"Between the cradle and the shroud,
If chance, amid the pilgrim crowd,
Though strange the time and strange the
place,

We light on some familiar face,

Once loved and known, as friend knows friend,

In whom a thousand memories blend,
Which whilom slumbered dull and dim,
But rise in light and cling to him;
Though not a trait of old as wont,
Though care has knit the ample front,
And vice unstrung the well-toned frame,
Still something,-something is the same.
But if we ever hope to find

Some traces in that life-worn mind
Of its pure self, its simple being,
Such as it was, when unforeseeing,
We thought that Nature's laws would fail,
Ere Sin could make its boldness quail;
Such as it was, ere sensuous things
Had clipt the bird of Eden's wings,
Ere stifled groan and secret sigh
Replaced the tear so soon brush'd by,
Tis vain,-alas, for human shame!
There nothing, nothing is the same.

"Oh that the painter's favorite scheme
Were not alone a painter's dream!
O that the Paradise he feigns,
Where Innocence with Childhood reigns,
And cherub forms and infant guise
Inclose the heart divinely wise,
Were not alone a Poet's creed,-
No symbol,-but a truth indeed!
That all this circling life might close
Its wearied course where first it rose,
And that our second life must be
A new, eternal, infancy,
Keeping the bliss we lose as men,
To be for aye as we were then!"

THE FRIENDSHIP FLOWER.

Little of care or thought are wanted
To guard its beauty fresh and whole;
But when the one impassioned age
Has full revealed the magic bloom,
A wise and holy tutelage
Alone can shun the open tomb.

“It is not Absence you should dread,--
For Absence is the very air
In which, if sound at root, the head
Shall wave most wonderful and fair;
With sympathies of joy and sorrow
Fed, as with morn and even dews,
Ideal colouring it may borrow
Richer than ever earthly hues.

"But oft the plant, whose leaves unsere
Refresh the desert, hardly brooks
The common-peopled atmosphere
Of daily thoughts and words and looks;
It trembles at the brushing wings
Of many a careless fashion-fly,
And strange suspicions aim their stings
To taint it as they wanton by.

"Rare is the heart to bear a flower,
That must not wholly fall and fade,
Where alien feelings, hour by hour,
Spring up, beset, and overshade;
Better, a child of care and toil,
To glorify some needy spot,
Than in a glad redundant soil
To pine neglected and forgot.

"Yet when, at last, by human slight,
Or close of their permitted day,

From the sweet world of life and light Such fine creations lapse away,Bury the relics that retain

Sick odours of departed pride,

"When first the Friendship-flower is Hoard as ye will your memory's gain.

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But let them perish where they died.'

FAMILIAR LOVE.

"We read together, reading the same book,
Our heads bent forward in a half embrace,
So that each shade that either spirit took
Was straight reflected in the other's face;
We read, not silent, nor aloud. but each
Followed the eye that passed the page along,

With a low murmuring sound, that was not speeeh,
Yet with so much monotony,

In its half slumbering harmony,
You might not call it song;

More like a bee, that in the noon rejoices,
Than any customed mood of human voices.

"Then if some wayward or disputed sense
Made cease awhile that music, and brought on
A strife of gracious-worded difference,
Too light to hurt our soul's dear unison,

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