FLOWERS

PLUCKED BY A

TRAVELLER ON THE JOURNEY OF LIFE.

BY

CHARLES T. CONGDON.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever ;
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams; anel health, and quiet breathing.

John Keats. Endymion.

BOSTON:

PUBLISHED BY GEORGE W. LIGHT.

MDCCCXL.

HARVARD UNIVERSITY

LIBRARY
MAR 5 1941

TO

MY COLLEGE FRIENDS

THESE TRIFLES

ARE

DEDICATED.

« Could we contract the choice of nature's plenty

Into one form, and that form to contain
All delicates, which the wanton sense
Would relish, or desire to invent; to please it,
The present were unworthy, for to purchase
The sacred league of friendship.”

1 *

NOTICE.

THESE poems I have arranged in this volume in the order in which I wrote them. They have been some pleasure to me, and I would fain hope that others may find some pleasure in them, also. I expect and desire not fame; yet it is pleasant to me to know, that those who know me best and whom I love best, have expressed a desire to have them collected. To such I present the volume. I will not plead my youth in extenuation of its faults; because I think that some of the best and most beautiful thoughts of the mind, abide in the younger heart; and if the sentiments of a production be truthful, I envy not the mind of the man who can find fault with words and quarrel with tropes and metaphors. Be it “good, bad or indifferent,” I cast this, but a crumb at best, upon the waters. The