And sounded all the depths and shoals of honor-O WORLD! O Life! O Time!
Found thee a way, out of his wreck, to rise in ; On whose last steps I climb,
A sure and safe one, though thy master missed it.
Mark but my fall, and that that ruined me.
Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition:
By that sin fell the angels; how can man, then,
The image of his Maker, hope to win by 't?
Love thyself last cherish those hearts that hate

Trembling at that where I had stood before.
When will return the glory of your prime ?
No more,
O nevermore!

thee:

:

Corruption wins not more than honesty.
Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace,

To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not :
Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's,
Thy God's, and truth's; then if thou fall'st, O
Cromwell!

Thou fall'st a blessed martyr.

Serve the king; and - pr'ythee, lead me in:
There take an inventory of all I have,
To the last penny; 't is the king's my robe,
And my integrity to heaven, is all

I dare now call mine own. O Cromwell, Crom-
well!

Had I but served my God with half the zeal
I served my king, he would not in mine age
Have left me naked to mine enemies!

Out of the day and night
A joy has taken flight:

Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar
Move my faint heart with grief, but with delight
No more,
O nevermore !

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.

"WHAT CAN AN OLD MAN DO BUT DIE?"

SPRING it is cheery,

Winter is dreary,

Green leaves hang, but the brown must fly
When he's forsaken,

Withered and shaken,

What can an old man do but die ?

CATSKILL MOUNTAIN HOUSE.

From mountain top to base, a whispering sea
WAVE after wave of greenness rolling down
Of affluent leaves through which the viewless
breeze

Murmurs mysteriously.

THERE is such power even in smallest things

To bring the dear past back; a flower's tint, A snatch of some old song, the fleeting glint Of sunbeams on the wave- each vivid brings

The lost days up, as from the idle strings

Of wind-harp sad a breeze evokes the hint
Of antique tunes. A glove which keeps imprint
Of a loved hand the heart with torture wrings

By memory of a clasp meant more than speech;

A face seen in the crowd with curve of cheek Or sweep of eyelash our woe's core can reach.

How strong is love to yearn, and yet how weak

To strive with fate: the lesson all things teach, As of the past in myriad ways they speak.

ARLO BATES.

LIFE, like a romping school-boy full of glee,
Doth bear us on his shoulders for a time:
There is no path too steep for him to climb,
With strong lithe limbs, as agile and as free
As some young roe, he speeds by vale and sea,
By flowery mead, by mountain-peak sublime,
And all the world seems motion set to rhyme,
Till, tired out, he cries, "Now carry me!"

In vain we murmur. "Come," Life says, "Fair play," And seizes on us. God! He goads us so.

He does not let us sit down all the day.
At each new step we feel the burden grow,
Till our bent backs seem breaking as we go,
Watching for Death to meet us on the way.

ELLA WHEELER WILCOX.

THE APPROACH OF AGE.
FROM "TALES OF THE HALL."

SIX years had passed, and forty ere the six,
When Time began to play his usual tricks :
The locks once comely in a virgin's sight,
Locks of pure brown, displayed the encroaching
white;

The blood, once fervid, now to cool began,
And Time's strong pressure to subdue the man.
I rode or walked as I was wont before,
But now the bounding spirit was no more;
A moderate pace would now my body heat,
A walk of moderate length distress my feet.
I showed my stranger guest those hills sublime,
But said, "The view is poor, we need not climb."
At a friend's mansion I began to dread
The cold neat parlor and the gay glazed bed ;
At home I felt a more decided taste,
And must have all things in my order placed.
I ceased to hunt; my horses pleased me less,
My dinner more; I learned to play at chess.
I took my dog and gun, but saw the brute
Was disappointed that I did not shoot.
My morning walks I now could bear to lose,
And blessed the shower that gave me not to
choose.

In fact, I felt a languor stealing on;

The active arm, the agile hand, were gone;

Small daily actions into habits grew,

And new dislike to forms and fashions new.

I loved my trees in order to dispose ;

I numbered peaches, looked how stocks arose ;
Told the same story oft, -in short, began to prose.

OLD.

GEORGE CRABBE.

By the wayside, on a mossy stone,

Sat a hoary pilgrim, sadly musing;
Oft I marked him sitting there alone,
All the landscape, like a page, perusing;
Poor, unknown,

By the wayside, on a mossy stone.