“Hæc decies repetita [non] placebit.”—ARS POETICA.

FLACCUS, you write us charming songs:

No bard we know possesses

In such perfection what belongs

To brief and bright addresses;

No man can say that Life is short

With mien so little fretful;

No man to Virtue's paths exhort

In phrases less regretful;

Or touch, with more serene distress,

On Fortune's ways erratic;

And then delightfully digress

From Alp to Adriatic :

All this is well, no doubt, and tends

O, spare to sing, what none deny,

That things we love decay ;

That Time and Gold have wings to fly ;

That all must Fate obey!

Or bid us dine-on this day week

And pour us, if you can,

As soft and sleek as girlish cheek,

Your inmost Cæcuban ;—

Of that we fear not overplus;
But your didactic' tap'-

Forgive us!-grows monotonous;

Nunc vale! Verbum sap.

DAISY'S VALENTINES.

ALL night through Daisy's sleep, it seems,

Have ceaseless "rat-tats" thundered;

All night through Daisy's rosy dreams
Have devious Postmen blundered,

Delivering letters round her bed,

Suggestive missives, sealed with red,

And franked of course with due Queen's-head,—

While Daisy lay and wondered.

But now, when chirping birds begin,

And Day puts off the Quaker,

When Cook renews her morning din,

And rates the cheerful baker,

She dreams her dream no dream at all,
For, just as pigeons come at call,

Winged letters flutter down, and fall

Around her head, and wake her.

Yes, there they are! With quirk and twist,

And fraudful arts directed;

(Save Grandpapa's dear stiff old "fist,"

Through all disguise detected ;)

But which is his, her young Lothair's,

Who wooed her on the school-room stairs

With three sweet cakes, and two ripe pears,

In one neat pile collected?