SINGLE POEMS.

With “ Laws of Whist," and those of Libel, And Euclid, and the Mormon Bible.

And some are dear as friends, and some

We keep because we need them; And some we ward from worm and thumb,

And love too well to read them. My own are poor and mostly new, But I've an Elzevir or two.

OLD AND YOUNG.

I.
THEY soon grow old who grope for gold
In marts where all is bought and sold:
Who hire for self and on some shelf
In darkened vaults hoard up their pelf,
Cankered and crusted o'er with mold.
For them their youth itself is old.

II.
They ne'er grow old who gather gold
Where Spring awakes and flowers unfold;
Where suns arise in joyous skies,
And fill the soul within their eyes.
For them the immortal bards have sung:
For them old age itself is young.

CHRISTOPHER PEASE CRANCH.

That as a gift is prized, the next

For trouble in the finding; This Aldine for its early text,

That Plantin for the binding; This

sorry Herrick hides a flower, The record of one perfect hour.

But whether it be worth or looks

We gently love or strongly, Such virtue doth reside in books

We scarce can love them wrongly; To sages an eternal school, A hobby (harmless) to the fool.

Nor altogether fool is he

Who orders, free from doubt, Those books which "no good library

Should ever be without," And blandly locks the well-glazed door On tomes that issue never more.

IN GOD'S ACRE.

I.
Thou art alive, O grave,-
Thou with thy living grass,
Blown of all winds that pass, -
Thou with thy daisies white,
Dewy at morn and night,-
Thou on whose granite stone
Greenly the moss has grown, -
Thou on whose holy mound,
Through the whole summer round,
Sweetly the roses thrive,-
Thou art alive!
O grave, thou art alive!

II.
Answer me then, O grave,-
Yea, from thy living bloom
Speak to me, O green tomb,-
Say if the maid I know,
Sepulchred here below,-
Say if the sweet white face,
Hidden in this dark place, -
Say if the hair of gold
Buried amid thy mould, -
Say, O thou grave, her bed, -
Is my love dead?
O say, are the dead dead?

THEODORE TILTON.

DE LIBRIS. TRUE—there are books and books. There's Gray,

For instance, and there's Bacon; There's Longfellow, and Monstrelet,

And also Colton's “ Lacon,”

Two things are ever with us, youth and deathThe Faun that pipes, and Pluto unbeguiled; From age to age still plays the eternal child,

Nor heeds the eternal doom that followeth,
Ah, precious days of unreflecting breath!
There lay (so might we fancy) one who smiled
Through all life's paradox unreconciled,
Enjoying years the grown man squandereth.
And if his latest hour was touched with pain,
And some dim trouble crossed his childish brain,
He knew no fear,--in death more blest than we.
And now from God's clear light he smiles again,
Not ill-content his mortal part to see
In such a spot, amid such company.

E. C. LEFROY,

They gave him light in his ways,

And love, and a space for delight, And beauty and length of days,

And night, and sleep in the night. His speech is a burning fire;

With his lips he travaileth; In his heart is a blind desire,

In his eyes foreknowledge of death; He weaves, and is clothed with derision;

Sows, and he shall not reap; His life is a watch or a vision Between a sleep and a sleep.

ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE,

“ There is nobody but Rees Morgan's cow

Watching the dusk on the milk-white sea. 'Tis the time and place for a life-long vow,

Such as I owe you, and you owe me.”

a

“Oh, Willie, how can I, in this dark well?

I shall drop the brown pitcher, if you let go: The long roof is murmuring like a sea-shell,

And the shadows are shuddering to and fro."

And the high gods took in hand

Fire, and the falling of tears, And a measure of sliding sand

From under the feet of the years; And froth and drift of the sea;

And dust of the laboring earth; And bodies of things to be

In the houses of death and of birth; And wrought with weeping and laughter,

And fashioned with loathing and love,
With life before and after

And death beneath and above,
For a day and a night and a morrow,

That his strength might endure for a span With travail and heavy sorrow,

The holy spirit of man.

“ 'Tis the sound of the ebb in Newton Bay,

Quickens the spring as the tide grows less, Even as true love flows alway

Counter the flood of the world's success,"

“There is no other way for love to flow;

Whenever it springs in a woman's breast, To the home of its own heart it must go,

And run contrary to all the rest."

“Then fill the sweet cup of your hand, my love,

And pledge me your maiden faith thereon, By the touch of the lettered stone above,

And the holy water of St. John."

From the winds of the north and the south

They gathered as unto strife; They breathed upon his mouth,

They filled his body with life; Eyesight and speech they wrought

For the veils of the soul therein, A time for labor and thought,

A time to serve and to sin;

“Oh what shall I say? My heart drops low;

My fingers are cold, and my hand too flat. Is love to be measured hy handful so?

And you know that I love you-without that.”