"And her modest answer and graceful air Show her wise and good as she is fair.

"Would she were mine, and I to-day, Like her, a harvester of hay.

"No doubtful balance of rights and wrongs, Nor weary lawyers with endless tongues,

"But low of cattle, and song of birds, And health, and quiet, and loving words."

But he thought of his sister, proud and cold, And his mother, vain of her rank and gold.

So, closing his heart, the Judge rode on,
And Maud was left in the field alone.

But the lawyers smiled that afternoon,
When he hummed in court an old love tune;
And the young girl mused beside the well,
Till the rain on the unraked clover fell.

He wedded a wife of richest dower,
Who lived for fashion, as he for power.
Yet oft, in his marble hearth's bright glow,
He watched a picture come and go;

And sweet Maud Muller's hazel eyes
Looked out in their innocent surprise.

Oft, when the wine in his glass was red,
He longed for the wayside well instead,

And closed his eyes on his garnished rooms,
To dream of meadows and clover blooms;

And the proud man sighed with a secret pain, "Ah, that I were free again!

"Free as when I rode that day Where the barefoot maiden raked the hay."

She wedded a man unlearned and poor, And many children played round her door. But care and sorrow, and child-birth pain, Left their traces on heart and brain.

And oft, when the summer sun shone hot
On the new-mown hay in the meadow lot,
And she heard the little spring brook fall
Over the roadside, through the wall,

In the shade of the apple-tree again
She saw a rider draw his rein,

And, gazing down with a timid grace,
She felt his pleased eyes read her face.

Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls
Stretched away into stately halls;

The weary wheel to a spinnet turned,
The tallow candle an astral burned;

And for him who sat by the chimney lug,
Dozing and grumbling o'er pipe and mug,

A manly form at her side she saw,
And joy was duty and love was law.

Then she took up her burden of life again,
Saying only, "It might have been.”

Alas for maiden, alas for judge,
For rich repiner and household drudge!
God pity them both! and pity us all,
Who vainly the dreams of youth recall ;

All in vain I tried each topic, Ranged from polar climes to tropic, Every commonplace I started met with yes-or-no replies.

For her mother - stiff and stately,

As if starched and ironed lately

Sat erect, with rigid elbows bedded thus in curv、 ing palms;

There she sat on guard before us,
And in words precise, decorous,

And most calm, reviewed the weather, and recited several psalms.

How without abruptly ending
This my visit, and offending

Wealthy neighbors, was t e problem which em. ployed my mental care;

When the butler, bowing lowly,
Uttered clearly, stiffly, slowly,

"Madam, please, the gardener wants you,"

Heaven, I thought, has heard my prayer.

"Pardon me!" she grandly uttered; Bowing low, I gladly muttered, "Surely, madam!" and, relieved, I turned to scan the daughter's face :

Ha! what pent-up mirth outflashes From beneath those pencilled lashes! How the drill of Quaker custom yields to Nature's brilliant grace.

Brightly springs the prisoned fountain

From the side of Delphi's mountain When the stone that weighed upon its buoyant life is thrust aside;

So the long-enforced staguation
Of the maiden's conversation

Now imparted five-fold brilliance to its evervarying tide.

Widely ranging, quickly changing,
Witty, winning, from beginning

Unto end I listened, merely flinging in a casual word;

Eloquent, and yet how simple!

Hand and eye, and eddying dimple,

Tongue and lip together made a music seen as well as heard.

When the noonday woods are ringing,
All the birds of summer singing,

Suddenly there falls a silence, and we know a serpent nigh:

So upon the door a rattle
Stopped our animated tattle,

And the stately mother found us prim enough to

suit her eye.

CHARLES G. HALPINE.

THE CHESS-BOARD.

My little love, do you remember,
Ere we were grown so sadly wise,
Those evenings in the bleak December,
Curtained warm from the snowy weather,
When you and I played chess together,

Checkmated by each other's eyes?

Ah! still I see your soft white hand Hovering warm o'er Queen and Knight;

Brave Pawns in valiant battle stand; The double Castles guard the wings; The Bishop, bent on distant things, Moves, sidling, through the fight.

Our fingers touch; our glances meet, And falter; falls your golden hair

Against my cheek; your bosom sweet is heaving. Down the field, your Queen Rides slow, her soldiery all between, And checks me unaware.

en's protecting power,

If winged thoughts that flit to thee a thousand in an hour,

If busy Fancy blending thee with all my future lot,

If this thou call'st " forgetting," thou indeed shalt be forgot!

"Forget thee?" Bid the forest-birds forget their sweetest tune;

"Forget thee?". - Bid the sea forget to swell beneath the moon;

Bid the thirsty flowers forget to drink the eve's refreshing dew;

Thyself forget thine "own dear land," and its "mountains wild and blue;" Forget each old familiar face, each long-remem

bered spot; When these things are forgot by thee, then thou shalt be forgot!

AT setting day and rising morn,

With soul that still shall love thee, I'll ask of Heaven thy afe return,

With all that can improve thee. I'll visit aft the birken bush,

Where first thou kindly told me Sweet tales of love, and hid thy blush, Whilst round thou didst infold me. To all our haunts I will repair,

By greenwood shaw or fountain; Or where the summer day I'd share

With thee upon yon mountain; There will I tell the trees and flowers, From thoughts unfeigned and tender, By vows you're mine, by love is yours A heart which cannot wander.

ALLAN RAMSAY.

LOVE.

ALL thoughts, all passions, all delights,
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,
All are but ministers of Love,
And feed his sacred flame.

Oft in my waking dreams do I Live o'er again that happy hour, When midway on the mount I lay Beside the ruined tower.

The moonshine stealing o'er the scene
Had blended with the lights of eve;
And she was there, my hope, my joy,
My own dear Genevieve!

She leaned against the armed man,
The statue of the armed knight;
She stood and listened to my lay,

Amid the lingering light.

Few sorrows hath she of her own, My hope my joy! my Genevieve ! She loves me best whene'er I sing

The songs that make ber grieve.

I played a soft and doleful air,
I sang an old and moving story,
An old rude song, that suited well

That ruin wild and hoary.

She listened with a flitting blush,
With downcast eyes and modest grace ;
For well she knew, I could not choose
But gaze upon her face.

I told her of the Knight that wore
Upon his shield a burning brand ;
And that for ten long years he wooed
The Lady of the Land.

:

I told her how he pined and ah!
The deep, the low, the pleading tone
With which I sang another's love
Interpreted my own.

She listened with a flitting blush,
With downcast eyes and modest grace;
And she forgave me that I gazed

Too fondly on her face.

But when I told the cruel scorn
That crazed that bold and lovely Knight,
And that he crossed the mountain-woods,
Nor rested day nor night;

That sometimes from the savage den,
And sometimes from the darksome shade,
And sometimes starting up at once

In green and sunny glade,