THE BEAUTIFUL.

The beautiful is round us, where'er we chance to stray, By nature's silvery fountain, where its gleaming waters

play;

In the rustling of the forest leaf, in the flower lips of the sod,

In all the speech-like eloquence that telleth us of God.

The beautiful is round us in the morning's early beam, When it lifts the shadowy mantle from the hill-tops lone and green;

And when the night unfoldeth its glories to our view, The beautiful comes mingled with the infinite and true.

In the spring-time's early breath, in the summer's fervid-beam,

In the dancing of the zephyrs, the sparkle on the stream,

In the russet robe of autumn, its crimson and its gold, In the jewels icy winter hangs on her forehead old.

The beautiful, the beautiful comes with its promptings pure,

And telleth us of glories which ever shall endure; For it whispers, as it passes, earth's brightest treasure known

Is but a shadow faint and weak from God's celestial

throne.

THE OLD COTTAGE.

DEDICATED TO L. K.

Beneath the ancient roof-tree, beneath these lowly walls,
What recollections of the past my memory recalls;
The bounding step of childhood, its wild and merry

glee,

The sobered tread of manhood, all found a home in thee

*

The holy joy of motherhood, the pang of parting breath, The farewell sad, the meeting fond, and the bitter wail of death,

Have each been felt and known here, in days now past

and gone;

But their memory is recorded in the old hearth stone.

Oh! many a fervid blessing from mother's lips were shed,

As heart to heart in fervent love the dear good night was said;

Those lingering voices of the past once in this quaint old room

Discoursed their tones of joyful love, a soul-dispelling gloom.

In other homes we find them, this once dear household band,

While she, the fond and loving, "a mother in the land," Renews the love of olden time as every added face Bespeaks a well-accorded claim, the children of her

race.

Then sacred be the memories of this old cottage home, Her sons will not forget them, though distant far they roam;

For when the soul grows weary with the changeful and

the new,

Here shall they find those golden links, the faithful and the true.

TO J. C. G.

I know you in your half disguise,
And J. C. G. will ever blend
With those dear memories of the past
That bind me to my absent friend.

I greet you with my pen and ink,
And say a loving "How d'ye do?"

And wish that you with me could look

Upon the Sound so clear and blue.

The white sails o'er the waters bend,

The swallows skim along the sea;
The air is trembling with the sound
Of nature's gushing melody.