A DECADE AND A SEPTENNATE.

X.
There be who hold within their hand the mighty things of state,

But to that sacred work devote but little good or great;
To crush the weak and rob the poor, such is their view of right,
Who subjects worse than cattle treat by simple force of might.

XI.
And while the peoples 'neath their sway are trampled in the dust

Such rulers wallow night and day in wantonness and lust;
Or careless of the world at large seek but themselves to please,
Indifferent to all else beside but luxury and ease.

XII.
Yet would they talk of “royal blood” or boast of “right Divine”,

Proud of their bygone ancestors whose deeds in history shine :
Esteeming that themselves are great, their blood of purest caste

Because of dead men's ancient deeds in centuries long past.

TRUE NOBILITY.
- OBILITY exists alone in character and worth;

Of“ one blood only God hath made all nations upon earth":
The high, the low, uncrowned and crowned, the wealthy and the poor,

The proud patrician and the prince, the peasant and the boor.

Each man's nobility is proved by thought and word and deed,

Nor less nor more because, forsooth! he comes of “noble " breed ; His individual self must stand before his God alone,

Nor can his father's virtues once for his ill-deeds atone.

Thus there be some who realize their proud and high estate,

And rightly estimate the charge and duly feel its weight:
Who take as from the hand of God their sceptre and their crown,

And only as His servants seek for honour and renown:

XVI.

Who while they hold the foremost place, know their deep need to learn,

And ever bend a willing ear, nor prudent counsels spurn,
Remembering that they also have a King all kings above,

And studying, like that King, to rule in wisdom and in love.

Solomon's CHOICE.
NCE on a time, in eastern land a youthful monarch dwelt,

Who need of wisdom from on high to rule his kingdom felt;
And not in vain request he made, that God would him impart
For going out and coming in "an understanding heart”.

XVIII.
r And God was pleased to listen to that youthful king's request,
ige And caused him before all the world to be supremely blest;
And that towards him He might His love conspicuously evince
Made him for wisdom, wealth and power unmatched before or since.

XIX.
And doubt we not in modern days that England's youthful Queen

In humble prayer for strength and grace by God was often seen;
That He an understanding heart would to His servant give,

That she in wisdom and in worth might speak and act and live.

And now that two score years have passed since that auspicious day

When in her hand was placed the orb that typified her sway,
Her people's hearts, close-knit to her's, with warm emotion swell,
Admitting she has worn her crown right royally and well.

THE Right DIVINE.
N every house where God is feared and Christian virtues shine

A monarch rules a subject race, and rules by right Divine;
But rules with sympathetic grace and not in despot sway,
While dutiful, in rev'rent love the subject ones obey.

XXII.
to Such is the type of the great King who ruleth over all,
Ki Before Whose universal throne mankind and angels fall :
In praise of Whose dominion vast the highest seraph sings,
And Whom unnumber'd worlds confess the mightiest KING OF KINGS,

XXIII.
ANCIENT OF Days, ETERNAL, I am, JEHOVAH, LORD,

Through everlasting circling years unknown and unexplored ;
Yet taking to Himself through Christ, these names all names above-

Our FATHER WHO IN HEAVEN IS, SPOUSE, HUSBAND, BRIDEG ROOM, LOVE!

And such, too, is the type of power for ruling empires great,

The lowly paying deference due to circumstance and state ; But only half the power possessed by the acknowledged head, That sometimes leading on the rest, but quite as often led.

Dulce Domum. C. UCH was the sphere, Princess beloved, in which thy lot was cast : (

Thy mother in such spirit ruled her territories vast; . And 'neath such genial influence thy youthful heart was reared Where love and virtue were enshrined, and God was duly feared.

XXVI.
RVT Thy royal mother's senators her just dominion own,
GF But they in chief direct affairs though she sits on the throne ;
And thus the balance duly kept by the firm threefold band,
Freedom and loyalty unite and flourish in the land.

XXVII.
Thy father was a king who ruled within the royal dome,

T'hy mother's subject out of doors, she yet was his at home ;
Her's was the councillors' wise advice that clemency and grace
Should mark the rule he exercised on his small subject race.

XXVIII.
Thus each to each in loyalty a loving will inclined,

She with a heart most womanly, and he a regal mind;
In their respective spheres of life they wrought and ruled and reigned,
And in the ways of usefulness the olive-branches trained.

THE RIVEN OAK. A ND so the years slipped by, Princess, till thou hadst come of age,

And brightly shone the morning sun on life's now radiant page ; B And loyal hearts beat high for thee and him thou stood'st beside,

So soon to take thee to himself, a fair and comely bride.

And then drew on the closing weeks of the old dying year,

And happy, joyous Christmas-tide approached each day more near,
When the unbroken peace was marred by one o'erwhelming stroke,
And the relentless shaft of death laid low the Royal Oak.

XXXI.
The issue of men's lives and deaths are in the Sovereign hand

By which the orbits of the stars are meted out and spann'd;
And though it's purpose and intent we often fail to see,
'Tis our's to bend submissive down before the high decree.

XXXII.
So, if thy father's sun scarce rose to it's meridian height

Ere it was lost to human view in darkness of the night,
Catching the glorious, parting tints from out the glowing west,

With Him Who“ doeth all things well” we silent leave the rest.

SPRING BUDS.
ND thou it was, in filial love, who blessed his closing hours

With thoughtfulness and fortitude beyond a maiden's powers ;
And played the old familiar airs, till overwhelmed with grief,
Thou wast compelled to haste away and find, in tears, relief.

XXXIV.
And when it was made known to thee on that momentous day

The father whom thou lovedst so well had passed from earth away,
Such was the shock to thy young heart that thou, too, wast laid low,
And fears were felt lest thou as well hadst sunk beneath the blow.

xxxy.
But thou wast spared to comfort her who chiefly felt the smart,

Whose crown and sceptre were in vain to foil the barbed dart;
Till duties of another kind forbade thy longer stay,
And leaning on thy husband's arm, thou spedd'st upon thy way.

XXXVI.
And if upon another soil thy future home was placed,

Thy well-known features from our minds were not for that effaced ;
And though the “silver streak” might serve to keep our forms apart,

Thou wast the “Princess Alice” still to every loyal heart.

THE STRAY SHEEP.
E knew not then, we know not now, what was thy inner life,

The secret motions of thy breast as mother, maid and wife :
Our eye can never see the steps thy royal footsteps trod,
Or how was imaged on thy soul the likeness of thy God.

XXXVIII.
But idle ears or sland'rous tongues, capricious in their praise,

Reluctant not too often found some fresh report to raise,
To every floating gossip might their best attention lend.
And still find nought in thee to blame or likely to offend ;

XXXIX.
Save only if the tale be true that thou didst heed awhile

The lips of learned ignorance, so subtle to beguile,
While for a space thy feet were lured in error's paths to stray

And for a dense and mental maze to quit “the narrow way.”

Till God, in mercy to thy soul, took Home thy darling child,

And led thee, plunged in darkness, back from the bleak desert wild; Where in thy grief thou mightest look in vain for balm and rest,

To find it only in repose upon thy Saviour's breast.

WITHIN THE FOLD.
UT once brought safely back again, and housed within the fold,

Thou feddest on the pastures green that thou hadst loved of old;
Thy “life was hid with Christ in God," and hence thy constant aim,

Was ever to be found in Him and glorify His name.

Methinks vain speculations were no longer now indulged,

And in unreasoning reasoning thy thoughts were seldom plunged ;
For in the boldest ventures of the farthest-seeing mind
In vain thou wouldest search for peace—would'st search, but never find.

XLIII.
Hence the false doctrines failed to yield to thee their former zest,

For when into the furnace cast they would not stand the test;
The ore, when subjected to heat, was found but base alloy,
And only vital faith in Christ could change lament to joy.

XLIV.
Thus it was only unto Him to solace those in grief

-The MAN OF SORROWS—thou didst point for succour and relief : To Him who spake the precious words to all with care opprest,

“YE HEAVY-LADEN COME TO ME, AND I WILL GIVE YOU REST.”

THE Clash OF ARMS.
EANWHILE, the trump of war was heard in hovel and in hall,

And rich and poor men left their homes, obedient to the call,
To blast ten thousand happy hearts, to end ten thousand lives,
And make ten thousand widows of ten thousand smiling wives :

XLVI.
Depriving of a father's care ten myriad girls and boys,
3 Blighting their childhood and their youth, to woes transforming joys;
Filling with human blood the streets, the meadows, and the brooks,
Changing men's ploughshares into swords, to spears their pruning-hooks:

XLVII.
Strewing with desolation dire the valley and the plain,

Wantonly burning human food, God's glorious, golden grain !
Pillaging temples, laying homesteads level with the dust,
Giving licentiousness uncheck'd to plunder and to lust!

XLVIII.
And if thou wert exempted then from more appalling harm,

Not more than others wast thou free from terror and alarm ;
For he on whom thou leanedest had to buckle on the sword,
To shed the blood of others, or to have his own outpoured.

THE IRONY OF HEROISM.
200 soon the hospitals were filled with dying and with dead,

But thou wast there in readiness beside the soldier's bed:
To help if limbs were shatter'd, or if brow with pain was wrung,

The wound to dress, the anguish soothe, or cool the burning tongue.

A DECADE AND A SEPTENNATE.

L.
Strange irony of regal life! grim paradox of war!

Fantastic forms of courage rise our hazy view before;
For one 'tis right in human flesh to plunge the glittering blade,
Right for another to bind up the wounds the first has made !

LI.
Princes who are but tender lads are taught to show their skill,

And learn betimes the latest modes and fashions how to kill,
Princesses learning that on them the happiness devolves,
Of counteracting the results such ghastly work involves.

LII.
The husband goes to battle forth to torture and to slay,

The wife receives with open arms the victims of the fray;
Sister and brother do their best to succour and to smite,

Great God! who reignest over all, we ask Thee—Is It Right?

DISTINGUISHED VALOUR.
EN practise in their early days on foxes and on hares,

And anything too helpless to escape their guns and snares ;
And think it womanish and weak for others' pangs to feel,
But manly to possess a heart as cold and hard as steel.

LIV. And when they grow to riper years such practice bears its fruit, *

Nor think they shedding human blood just cause for ill repute ;
Souls red with ten-fold murder they deem the ones for fame,
And care not for the damning guilt, the cruelty, and shame.

LV.
I asked what meant the medal that a doughty soldier wore :

“Distinguished valour on the field” were the words it bore ; “One morn ere he had breakfasted," that warrior answer made,

“Nine men in death upon the ground he valiantly had laid !”

Distinguished valour! holy God, ope Thou our rulers' eyes,

Make them discern wherein with Thee distinguished valour lies : 0, Lord, have mercy on us! and to keep this sacred law

“ Thou shalt not kill ”-incline our hearts in time of peace and war.

RETRIBUTION
HE struggle ended, and the Power that called that struggle forth,

Could not, with all its skill, withstand the legions from the north;
* The ruler that in lawlessness and perfidy began,
Gave up the sword, for ever sheathed, and fell before Sedan.

LVIII.
a And those who floated to the top on revolution's flood

To grasp at place and power by means of perfidy and blood,
On revolution's seething tide in twenty years were borne,
To find their empire and their rule for ever past and gone.

LIX.
Fit ending! would to God when kings and nations fiercely burn,

Lusting for what is not their own, they would these lessons learn
That whatsoe'er is sown in spring the autumn must produce,

And he that girdeth on the sword shall perish in its use.