TWO WORLDS.

OD'S world is bathed in beauty,
God's world is steeped in light;
It is the self-same glory

That makes the day so bright,
Which thrills the earth with music,
Or hangs the stars in night.

Hid in earth's mines of silver,
Floating on clouds above,
Ringing in Autumn's tempest,
Murmured by every dove,
One thought fills God's creation,
His own great name of Love!

In God's world Strength is lovely,
And so is Beauty strong,

And Light God's glorious shadow

To both great gifts belong;

And they all melt into sweetness,
And fill the earth with Song.

Above God's world bends Heaven,
With day's kiss pure and bright,

Or folds her still more fondly

In the tender shade of night; And she casts back Heaven's sweetness, In fragrant love and light.

God's world has one great echo ;

Whether calm blue mists are curled,

Or lingering dew-drops quiver,
Or red storms are unfurled;
The same deep love is throbbing
Through the great heart of God's world.

Man's world is black and blighted,
Steeped through with self and sin;
And should his feeble purpose

Some feeble good begin,

The work is marred and tainted
By Leprosy within.

Man's world is bleak and bitter;
Wherever he has trod,
He spoils the tender beauty
That blossoms on the sod,

And blasts the loving Heaven
Of the great, good world of God.

There Strength on coward weakness
In cruel might will roll;
Beauty and Joy are cankers
That eat away the soul;
And Love O God, avenge it
The plague-spot of the whole.

Man's world is Pain and Terror;
He found it pure and fair,
And wove in nets of sorrow
The golden summer air.

Black, hideous, cold, and dreary,
Man's curse, not God's, is there.

And yet God's world is speaking :
Man will not hear it call;

But listens where the echoes
Of his own discords fall,
Then clamors back to Heaven
That God has done it all.

O God, man's heart is darkened,
He will not understand!
Show him Thy cloud and fire;

And, with Thine own right hand,
Then lead him through his desert,
Back to Thy Holy Land!

A NEW MOTHER.

WAS with my lady when she died: I it was who guided her weak hand For a blessing on each little head, Laid her baby by her on the bed, Heard the words they could not understand.

And I drew them round my knee that night, Hushed their childish glee, and made them say

They would keep her words with loving tears, They would not forget her dying fears Lest the thought of her should fade away.

I, who guessed what her last dread had been,
Made a promise to that still, cold face,

That her children's hearts, at any cost,
Should be with the mother they had lost,
When a stranger came to take her place.

And I knew so much! for I had lived
With my lady since her childhood: known
What her young and happy days had been,
And the grief no other eyes had seen
I had watched and sorrowed for alone.

Ah! she once had such a happy smile!
I had known how sorely she was tried:

Six short years before, her eyes were bright
As her little blue-eyed May's that night,
When she stood by her dead mother's side.

No, I will not say he was unkind;

But she had been used to love and praise.
He was somewhat grave, perhaps, in truth,
Could not weave her joyous, smiling youth
Into all his stern and serious ways.

She, who should have reigned a blooming flower, First in pride and honor, as in grace,

She, whose will had once ruled all around,
Queen and darling of us all, she found
Change indeed in that cold, stately place.

Yet she would not blame him, even to me,
Though she often sat and wept alone;

But she could not hide it near her death,

When she said with her last struggling breath, "Let my babies still remain my own!"

I it was who drew the sheet aside,
When he saw his dead wife's face.

That test

Seemed to strike right to his heart. In a strange, low whisper, to the dead, "God knows, love, I did it for the best!

He said,

And he wept-O yes,

I will be just

When I brought the children to him there,
Wondering sorrow in their baby eyes;

And he soothed them with his fond replies, Bidding me give double love and care.

Ah, I loved them well for her dear sake:
Little Arthur, with his serious air;

May, with all her mother's pretty ways,
Blushing, and at any word of praise
Shaking out her sunny golden hair.

And the little one of all

poor child!
She had cost that dear and precious life.
Once Sir Arthur spoke my lady's name,
When the baby's gloomy christening came,
And he called her " Olga like my wife!"

Save that time, he never spoke of her:
He grew graver, sterner, every day;

And the children felt it, for they dropped Low their vo ces, and their laughter stopped, While he stood and watched them at their play.

No, he never named their mother's name.
But I told them of her: told them all

She had been; so gentle, good, and bright;
And I always took them every night

Where her picture hung in the great hall.

There she stood: white daisies in her hand,
And her red lips parted as to speak

With a smile; the blue and sunny air
Seemed to stir her floating golden hair,
And to bring a faint blush on her check.