THIS song of mine

Is a Song of the Vine,

To be sung by the glowing embers
Of wayside inns,

When the rain begins

To darken the drear Novembers.

It is not a song
Of the Scuppernong,
From warm Carolinian valleys,
Nor the Isabel

And the Muscadel
That bask in our garden alleys.

Nor the red Mustang,
Whose clusters hang
O'er the waves of the Colorado,
And the fiery flood

Of whose purple blood
Has a dash of Spanish bravado.

For richest and best

Is the wine of the West,

That grows by the Beautiful River;
Whose sweet perfume
Fills all the room

With a benison on the giver.

And as hollow trees
Are the haunts of bees,
For ever going and coming;

So this crystal hive

Is all alive

With a swarming and buzzing and humming.

Very good in its way

Is the Verzenay,

Or the Sillery soft and creamy;

me.

And o'er the farms, "O chanticleer,

on,

Ye mariners, the night is gone."

And hurried landward far away, Crying, "Awake! it is the day." It said unto the forest, "Shout! Hang all your leafy banners out!"

It whispered to the fields of corn, "Bow down, and hail the coming morn." It shouted through the belfry-tower, "Awake, O bell! proclaim the hour." It crossed the churchyard with a sigh, And said, "Not yet in quiet lie."

WHENE'ER a noble deed is wrought,
Whene'er is spoken a noble thought,
Our hearts, in glad surprise,
To higher levels rise.

The tidal wave of deeper souls
Into our inmost being rolls,
And lifts us unawares
Out of all meaner cares.

Honour to those whose words or deeds
Thus help us in our daily needs,

And by their overflow

Raise us from what is low!

Thus thought I, as by night I read
Of the great army of the dead,

The trenches cold and damp,
The starved and frozen camp,-

The wounded from the battle-plain,
In dreary hospitals of pain,

The cheerless corridors,
The cold and stony floors.

Lo in that house of misery
A lady with a lamp I see

Pass through the glimmering gloom,
And flit from room to room.

And slow, as in a dream of bliss,
The speechless sufferer turns to kiss
Her shadow, as it falls
Upon the darkening walls.

As if a door in heaven should be
Opened and then closed suddenly,
The vision came and went,
The light shone and was spent.

On England's annals, through the long
Hereafter of her speech and song,
That light its rays shall cast
From portals of the past.

A Lady with a Lamp shall stand
In the great history of the land,
A noble type of good,
Heroic womanhood.

Nor even shall be wanting here
The palm, the lily, and the spear,
The symbols that of yore
Saint Filomena bore.

Ir was fifty years ago,

In the pleasant month of May, In the beautiful Pays de Vaud, A child in its cradle lay.

And Nature, the old nurse, took The child upon her knee, Saying "Here is a story-book

Thy Father has written for thee." "Come, wander with me," she said, "Into regions yet untrod; And read what is still unread

In the manuscripts of God." And he wandered away and away With Nature, the dear old nurse, Who sang to him night and day The rhymes of the universe.

And whenever the way seemed long,
Or his heart began to fail,
She would sing a more wonderful song,
Or tell a more marvellous tale.

So she keeps him still a child,

And will not let him go, Though at times his heart beats wild For the beautiful Pays de Vaud; Though at times he hears in his dreams The Ranz des Vaches of old, And the rush of mountain streams From glaciers clear and cold;

And the mother at home says, "Hark! For his voice I listen and yearn;

It is growing late and dark,

And my boy does not return!"

But Othere, the old sea-captain,
He neither paused nor stirred,
Till the King listened, and then
Once more took up his pen,

And wrote down every word.

"And now the land," said Othere,

"Bent southward suddenly, And I followed the curving shore, And ever southward bore

Into a nameless sea.

"And there we hunted the walrus,

The narwhale, and the seal;
Ha! 'twas a noble game!
And like the lightning's flame
Flew our harpoons of steel.

"There were six of us all together,
Norsemen of Helgoland;
In two days and no more

COME to me, O ye children!

For I hear you at your play,
And the questions that perplexed me
Have vanished quite away.

Ye open the eastern windows,

That look towards the sun,
Where thoughts are singing swallows,
And the brooks of morning run.

In your hearts are the birds and the sunshine,

In your thoughts the brooklet's flow, But in mine is the wind of Autumn, And the first fall of the snow.

Ah! what would the world be to us,
If the children were no more?
We should dread the desert behind us
Worse than the dark before.

What the leaves are to the forest,
With light and air for food,

Ere their sweet and tender juices
Have been hardened into wood,-
That to the world are children;

Through them it feels the glow
Of a brighter and sunnier climate
Than reaches the trunks below.

Come to me, O ye children!

And whisper in my ear

What the birds and the winds are singing

In your sunny atmosphere.

For what are all our contrivings,

And the wisdom of our books,
When compared with your caresses,
And the gladness of your looks?

Ye are better than all the ballads
That ever were sung or said;
For ye are living poems,

And all the rest are dead.

HAVE you read in the Talmud of old,
In the Legends the Rabbins have told

Of the limitless realms of the air,Have you read it, the marvellous story

Of Sandalphon, the Angel of Glory,
Sandalphon, the Angel of Prayer?

How, erect, at the outermost gates
Of the City Celestial he waits,

With his feet on the ladder of light, That, crowded with angels unnumbered, By Jacob was seen, as he slumbered Alone in the desert at night?

The Angels of Wind and of Fire
Chant only one hymn, and expire
With the song's irresistible stress;
Expire in their rapture and wonder,
As harp-strings are broken asunder
By music they throb to express.
But serene in the rapturous throng,
Unmoved by the rush of the song,

With eyes unimpassioned and slow,
Among the dead angels, the deathless
Sandalphon stands listening breathless

To sounds that ascend from below;

From the spirits on earth that adore, From the souls that entreat and implore

In the fervour and passion of prayer;

HAVE I dreamed? or was it real,
What I saw as in a vision,
When to marches hymeneal
In the land of the Ideal

Moved my thought o'er Fields Elysian? What are these the guests whose glances Seemed like sunshine gleaming round me?

These the wild, bewildering fancies,
That with dithyrambic dances,

As with magic circles, bound me ?

Ah! how cold are their caresses!

Pallid cheeks, and haggard bosoms! Spectral gleam their snow-white dresses, And from loose, dishevelled tresses

Fall the hyacinthine blossoms!

O my songs! whose winsome measures Filled my heart with secret rapture!

Children of my golden leisures!
Must even your delights and pleasures
Fade and perish with the capture ?