LIKE thy first Sister, when her years were few, God bless thee! May thy blameless life be hung WILLIAM HENRY WHITWORTH. I. THE PYRAMIDS. WHENCE and what are ye, or what have ye been? Who propped the starry axle with his hand) But monuments of Hope, ye tower sublime, II. NIPPED BUDS BETTER THAN LATER DISAPPOINTMENTS. WHO wishes the wild wind to blow, nor grieves And faded wreaths the last year's tempest leaves? There had the small birds on long summer eves Sung, careless how sere Autumn, with his crown Of amber beads and saffron-colored gown, The widowed woods of all their bloom bereaves. Yet are the happiest of the happy they (Did they but know their happiness) who go Before our hopes, those flowers of life, decay. They rest as soft and silent as the snow By the sea-shore on some calm winter's day: THOMAS DOUBLEDAY. I. THE POET'S SOLITUDE. THINK not the Poet's life although his cell Be seldom printed by the stranger's feet- Look at yon lone and solitary dell; The stream that loiters 'mid its stones can tell The foxglove, closing inly, like a shell; The hyacinth; the rose, of buds the chief; The thorn, bediamonded with dewy showers; The thyme's wild fragrance, and the heather bell; All, all are there. So vain is the belief That the sequestered path has fewest flowers. II. LIFE. COME, track with me this little vagrant rill, And playing with the stooping flowers at will; And hurries on, leaping with sparkling zest So let us live. Is not the life well-spent Which loves the lot that kindly Nature weaves Which throws light pleasure over true content, |