Comes he not forth more fresh and bright
From ocean's cooling caves?
Canst thou unmoved that deep world see,
That heaven of tranquil blue,
Where thine own face is beckoning thee

Down to the eternal dew?

The waters purled, the waters swelled,
They kissed his naked feet;
His heart a nameless transport held,
As if his love did greet.

She spake to him, she sang to him;
Then all with him was o'er,
Half drew she him, half sank he in,
He sank to rise no more.

GOETHE. Translation of CHARLES T. BROOKS.

THE NIGHTINGALE AND GLOW-WORM.
A NIGHTINGALE, that all day long
Had cheered the village with his song,
Nor yet at eve his note suspended,
Nor yet when eventide was ended,
Began to feel as well he might —
The keen demands of appetite;
When, looking eagerly around,
He spied, far off, upon the ground,
A something shining in the dark,
And knew the glow-worm by his spark;
So, stooping down from hawthorn top,
He thought to put him in his crop.
The worm, aware of his intent,
Harangued him thus, quite eloquent,

"Did you admire my lamp,” quoth he,
"As much as I your minstrelsy,
You would abhor to do me wrong,
As much as I to spoil your song;
For 't was the self-same Power divine
Taught you to sing, and me to shine;
That you with music, I with light,
Might beautify and cheer the night."
The songster heard his short oration,
And, warbling out his approbation,
Released him, as my story tells,
And found a supper somewhere else.

This moral, I think, may be safely attached, "Reckon not on your chickens before they are hatched."

JEFFREYS TAYLOR.

THE TOAD'S JOURNAL

[It is said that Belzoni, the traveller in Egypt, discovered a living toad in a temple which had been for ages buried in the sand.]

IN a land for antiquities greatly renowned
A traveller had dug wide and deep under ground,

A temple for ages entombed, to disclose, -
When, lo! he disturbed, in its secret repose,
A toad, from whose journal it plainly appears
It had lodged in that mansion some thousands of
years.

The roll which this reptile's long history records,
A treat to the sage antiquarian affords:
The sense by obscure hieroglyphics concealed,
Deep learning at length, with long labor, revealed.
The first thousand years as a specimen take,
The dates are omitted for brevity's sake:
"Crawled forth from some rubbish, and winked
with one eye;

Half opened the other, but could not tell why;
Stretched out my left leg, as it felt rather queer,
Then drew all together and slept for a year.
Awakened, felt chilly, - crept under a stone;
Was vastly contented with living alone.
One toe became wedged in the stone like a peg,
Could not get it away, had the cramp in my leg;
Began half to wish for a neighbor at hand
To loosen the stone, which was fast in the sand;
Pulled harder, then dozed, as I found 't was no

use;

Awoke the next summer, and lo! it was loose. Crawled forth from the stone when completely awake;

Crept into a corner and grinned at a snake.
Retreated, and found that I needed repose;
Curled up my damp limbs and prepared for a doze;
Fell sounder to sleep than was usual before,
And did not awake for a century or more;
But had a sweet dream, as I rather believe:
Methought it was light, and a fine summer's eve;
And I in some garden deliciously fed

In the pleasant moist shade of a strawberry-bed.
There fine speckled creatures claimed kindred with

Moves wearily on like a life's tedious tale,

Yet disturbs not the toad in his spacious abode, In the innermost heart of that flinty old stone, By the gray-haired moss and the lichen o'ergrown.

Down deep in a hollow some wiseacres sit
Like the toad in his cell in the stone;
Around them in daylight the blind owlets flit,
And their creeds are with ivy o'ergrown ;-
Their streams may go dry, and the wheels cease
to ply,

And their glimpses be few of the sun and the sky,
Still they hug to their breast every time-hon-

ored guest,

And slumber and doze in inglorious rest; For no progress they find in the wide sphere of mind,

For how can I thy words believe, When even God thou didst deceive?

A sea of lies art thou,
our sin
Only a drop that sea within."

"Not so," said Satan, "I serve God,
His angel now, and now his rod.

In tempting I both bless and curse,
Make good men better, bad men worse.
Good coin is mixed with bad, my brother,
I but distinguish one from the other."
"Granted," the Caliph said, "but still
You never tempt to good, but ill.

Tell then the truth, for well I know
You come as my most deadly foe."

Loud laughed the fiend. "You know me well,
Therefore my purpose I will tell.

If you had missed your prayer, I knew

A swift repentance would ensue.

OUR revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air;
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made of, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.

SHAKESPEARE