The Humbler Poets. A collection of newspaper and periodical verse, 1870 to 1885, by S. Thompson

Front matter

A COLLECTION OF NEWSPAPER AND PERIODICAL VERSE 1870 to 1885 By SLASON THOMPSON Read from some humbler poet, Whose songs gushed from his heart, As showers from the clouds of summer, Or tears from the eyelids start. Longfellow CHICAGO JANSEN, McCLURG, AND COMPANY Copyright, By Jansen, McClurg, & Co. a.d. 1885. EXPLANATORY. IT has been said that "he is no common benefactor who shrewdly gathers from the world's manifold literature its words of finest wit and maturest wis dom for our entertainment, instruction, and inspiration." But it is not well at all times to partake of the richest dishes or to drink the rarest wines. The finest wit and the maturest wisdom may be read too oft. There come hours to every lover of poetry when he wishes for "some simple and heart-felt lay," something that shall speak from out a mind feeling the every-day cares of life amid the multitude, and not from the heights to which the masters "proudly stooped."

It was this feeling that, some fifteen years ago, led me, a prose-thinker, to begin collecting from newspapers and the ephemeral literature of the day such verses as suited my mood, or which seemed the utterance of a soul that had put its thoughts into song. Upon the fly-leaf of my first scrap-book, surrounded by some now faded natural leaves of oak, maple, bilberry, and Virginia creeper, and two withered sprays of trailing arbutus, I find the misquotation from Love's Labor 's Lost, " As though he had been at a feast of languages and stolen the scraps." The succeeding pages show that it was not from a feast of languages, but from the daily board of wayfaring humanity, that such scraps were gleaned. In the course of years, and dur ing successive changes of residence from the extreme East to San Francisco and back, the collection grew until it contained over a thousand poems.

A friend suggested the collocation of the most valuable into some permanent EXPLANATORY. form. My sister, far removed from me as the crow flies, but near in sentiment and appreciation of the songs that "quiet the restless pulse of care," offered the use of her contemporaneous collection for the work. To her I am indebted for some eighty of the more truly poetical pieces included in this volume. Two friends in Chicago placed their collections at my disposal, from which I was able to add some twoscore poems to my store. These inde pendent sources served a further purpose to establish the character and fairly exhaustive scope of my own collection. Then came the difficult task of selection. My scraps bore no patent of nobility, no royal stamp to show they came from the mint of poetic inspiration.

Part I

Of Poets and Poetry 23 II. Among the Little Folk 37 III. For Christmas Tide 77 IV. Under the Open Sky 91 V. Love, Sentiment, and Friendship .... 123 VI. Echoes of the Past 167 VII. In the Twilight 199 VIII. Home and Fireside 217 IX. Hope, Encouragement, and Contentment . 233 X. Life, Religion, and Death's Mystery . . 277 XI. With a Story to Tell 329 XII. Parting and Absence 355 XIII. Tragedy and Sorrow 365 XIV. Every-day Lights and Shadows 3S1 XV. War and Peace 405 XVI. Comedy, Burlesque, Parody, and Epitaph . 421 Index of First Lines PACE Accursed 3^6 " Across the Lot " C. S. 326 Afeared of a Gal T35 Aftermath, The James Hendry .... 199 Age of Love, The 123 A Girl 's a Girl for A' That 445 Ah! Me 158 All the Same in the End 45° Antony and Cleopatra .... Gen. IK H. Lytle ... 143 Any One Will Do 43* Ash Pool, The 365 Askin^ T52 As Pebbles in the Sea 263 Astronomical 437 At Home Bernard Barton . ■ ■ . 217 At Last 4IQ At Sea '. .

F.W. Brooks . . . . 1S5 At the Court-House Door 392 At the Loom 2°5 At the Piano 2I2 Autumn II2 Baby in Church 7° Baby-Land 37 Baby Over the Way, The °r Baby's Letter 4| Baby's Rattle, A 4<> Bald-headed Tyrant, The 43 Bar-Tender's Story, The 397 Bean-Blossoms I0° Beautiful Grandmamma 59 Beautiful Snow James W. Watson ... 371 Beautiful Snow Major Sigourney ... 370 Before Sailing • 357 Bertie's Philosophy Eva M. Tafpan .... bo Better to Climb and Fall 24° Beyond the Haze 2°° " Bide a Wee, and Dinna Fret " . S. E. G 2oi Billy's Rose 33° Bird on the Telegraph Wire, The <P Birthday Greeting, A .... M. E. F. . ... . • i"2 Blue and the Gray, The . . . . Francis Miles Finch . . PAGR Blue and the Gray, The 4'2 Boat-Horn, The '77 Bottom Drawer, The Mary A. Barr ... 194 Boys' Rights Carrie May .... 67 Brandy and Soda Hugh Howard ... 447 Bridge of Life, The 277 Brook Song, A Eugene Field .... 109 Burial of Moses, The Mrs. C. F. Alexander . 310 By and By 241 By the Sea 29* Calumny 3°7 Captive Humming-Bird, The . . .

Joel T. Hart .... 94 Card Houses D5 Character and a Question, A 2S0 Cheerful Heart, The 233 Children's Bedtime, The 55 Children's Music, The 57 Chimes of Old England, The . . . Bishop Coxe .... 294 Chimney Nest, The Mary B. Dodge ... 93 Christmas Bells 82 Christmas Camp on the San Gabr'el Amelia Barr .... 79 Christmas Outcasts 82 Christmas Shadows 84 Christmas Song, A Mrs. Hattie S. Russell . 78 Christmas Treasures Eugene Field .... 81 Churning Song, The Silas Dinsmore ... 391 Cigarette Vagary, A Camilla K. von K. . . 421 City Contrasts 3S2 Cleopatra's Dream J. J. Owens .... 147 Cleopatra's Soliloquy Mary Bayard Clark . 146 Cleopatra to Antony Sarah Doudney Clarke 144 Cloud, The 120 Clover, The James Whilcomb Riley . 105 Cob House, The Kate Putnam Osgood . 64 Cockney Wail, A 42si "Coming Man," The 41 Compensation 258 Conceit, A Mortimer Collins . . 136 Conquered at Last Maria L. Eve . . . 416 Constant Friend, The 160 Content 267 Contentment Will S. Hayes . . . 267 Contentment . 266 Conversational 43S Couldn't Keep a Secret 126 Countersign was Marv, The . . .

Margaret Eytingc . . 407 Court of Berlin, The ' 351 Creeping Up the Stairs Rev.W.S.McFetridge . 57 Curtain Falls, The Joseph Verey .... 341 Dan's Wife 224 Darwinism in the Kitchen 425 Days That Are No More, The 168 Dead in His Bed A. L. Ballon .... 387 Decoration Day 415 Decreed 304 Deed and a Word, A Charles Afackay ... 29 Delights of Camp Life 439 Deserted PAGB Dolce Far Nicnte 161 Do Something 253 Dreams 175 Drifted out to S-a Rosa Hariwick Thorpe . 348 Driving Home the Cows .... Kate Putnam Osgood . . 405 Duty's Reward 399 Eliab Eliezer James Roann Reed . . . 292 Elswitha Mary Barry 203 Encore 228 "EnVoyago" Caroline A. Mason . . . 271 Exiles, The 222 Explanation, An Walter Learned . . . . 154 Failure 242 Fairy Faces 78 Fallen Geo. Edward Montgomery . 250 False and True 264 Farewell 356 Fate 360 Father John 401 Fifty Years Apart 2ir Fisherman Job James Roann Reed . . . 338 Flotsam and Jetsam 290 Flower from the Catskills, A . .

E. W. 101 Fool's Prayer, The 300 Forever 180 For Life and Death 346 Fortune My Foe Alfred P. Graves . . . 217 Fred Englehardt's Baby .... Charles Follen Adams . . 62 French with a Master .... Theodore Tilton .... 134 Friend or Foe? F.E. Weatherly . ... 129 Friendship 160 Friendship, Love, and Truth 161 Frivolous Girl, The 153 Gentleman Jim Daniel O'Connell . . . 400 Give Me Rest 322 " Give Thanks for What ? " 256 Going Home in the Morning . . Wayne Douglas .... 3S5 Going Softly 271 Golden Side, The 254 Gone 1.84 "Good-by" 355 Goodest Mother, The 63 Good-Night Hester A. Benedict ... 358 Gran'ma Al'us Does 52 Green Grass under the Snow, The Annie A. Preston . . . 255 Growing Old 208 Guilty, or Not Guilty ? 388 Hardest Time of All, The . . . Sarah Doudney Clarke . 262 Haunted Chambers 171 Hawthorn 19° Heads, Hearts, and Hands . . .

George W. Bungay . . 247 Heart's-Ease 103 Heliotrope I04 Her Name 72 Highway Cow, The 44° Hindoo Sceptic, The 3°j Hindoo's Death, The 442 Hint, A 44 Encore Gone INDEX OF TITLES. PAGE His Messenger 3°^ Home-Coming 218 Home is Where the Heart is 21S Hope Deferred 3£° Humming of the Wires, The . . . Edward A. Rand . . 384 Hymn to Santa Rita Alvey A. Adce ... 154 Ideal Future, An T. A. Harcourt ... 317 If I Should Die To-night 309 If We Knew ; or, Blessings of To-day Mrs. May Riley Smith 207 If You Want a Kiss, Why. Take It 423 Improved "Enoch Arden" 443 In a Graveyard 3*9 In Bay Chaleur Hezekiah Butter-worth . 343 In Praise of Wine 421 In Snow-time nS In the Hammock 15° Indecision 133 Interrogation Mark (?) F.A.LeH.. . . . 286 Invocation to Poesy, An Charles Maekay ... 23 It Is Common 32 I Wud Knot Dye in Wintur 427 Joy of Incompleteness, The 238 Jubilate 158 Judge Not 294 King's Picture, The Helen B. Bostwick . . 30 King's Ships, The 322 Kiss in the Rain, A 138 Last and Worst Frances Ekin Allison . 376 Last Arrival, The 41 Late October D.M.Jordan . . . 116 Lavender 192 Lay Me Low 313 Lay of a Dairy-Maid 439 Learn to Wait 240 Leedle Yawcob Strauss Charles Follen Adams . 62 L'Envoy Randolph . . . 136 Lesson in Mythology, A Eliza C. Hall .... 434 Life 279 Life 279 Life (A Literary Curiosity) ....

Airs. H. A. Deming . 283 Life and Death 2S8 Life or Death E. B 314 Life's Triumph Thomas S. Collier . . 236 Light F. IV. Bourdillon . . 125 Light and Love 129 Like His Mother Used to Make . . James Whitcomb Riley 227 Lily and the Linden, The .... Dr. Fred Crosby . . . 106 Lines by an Old Fogy 437 Lines on a Grasshopper 438 Little Church Round the Corner, The A. E. Lancaster . . . 305 Little Conqueror, The 69 Little Girl's Curiosity, A 54 Little Goldenhair 58 Little Peach, The Eugene Field .... 428 Little Phil 329 Little Stitches 226 living 289 Lost Babies, The PAGE Lost Letter, A Clement Scott .... 378 Lost Sheep, The Sally Pratt McLean . 205 Love and Labor . . . 236 Love and Pity 125 Love of the Past, The 167 Love's Belief 12S Love's Life, A 124 Love's Logic 130 Love's Transfiguration. 127 " Lulu " Carrie IV.

Thompson . 69 Mad, Mad Muse, The Robert J. Burdette , . 445 Magdalena 244 March 444 Mattie's Wants and Wishes 51 Maximus 255 Memories 169 Memory 168 Merry Christmas 77 Message of the Rose, The 99 Message of Victory, The .... Augusta Webster . .415 Meteors Anna Ph. Eichberg . 109 Midges in the Sunshine 290 Miller and the Maid, The . . . . F. N. Scott .... 137 Model Church, The 299 Moon and Dawn 117 Mother 185 Mother's Blessing, The 202 Music in the Soul 140 My Aim Thomas Guthrie . . . 277 My Cigarette C. P. Lummis . . . 214 My Josiar 159 My Lost Baby 47 My Lost Love - 1S6 My Mother's Hands 221 Narrow House, The 316 Nearing Port C. P. R 321 Near the Dawn 243 Nelly Tells How Baby Came . . . Thomas S. Collier . . 38 Nestlings P. C. A 92 New Baby, The 45 New Magdalen, The R. L. Cary, Jr. ... 345 New Year.

A 86 Night and Morning 307 Nocturne 24 No Sect in Heaven 296 Nothing at all in the Paper To-day 381 " Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep " 53 October D. M.Jordan . . . 115 October "5 Old Deacon's Lament, The . . . Mrs. E. T. Corbett . . 178 Old Fiddling Josey Irwin Russell .... 435 Old Friends 162 Old Rhyme, An *53 Old Song, An J7& Old Time and I Mark Lemon .... 440 One by One J7° Only 356 Only a Baby 39 178 INDEX OF TITLES. PAGE Only a Bit of Childhood Thrown Away Maud Moore .... 74 Only a Woman 370 Only Joe James Roann Reed . . 335 Orchard-Lands of Long Ago, The . James Whiteomb Riley 191 Our Childhood's Home R. S. 172 Our Darling 44 Our Last Toast Bartholomew Dowling . 409 Our Own 223 Outcast, The Mary E. Ritter ... 367 Outcast's Dream, The Olive Bell 336 Outwards or Homewards . . . . F. W. Bourdillon . . 238 Out West 446 " Owed " to My Pocket-Book 430 Pansies Sarah Doudncy Clarke 96 Paradise of Tears, The 320 Parson's Comforter, The ....

Frederick Langbridge . 323 Parting Coventry Patmore . . 355 Pastor's Reverie, The 188 Patient 265 Pat's Letter Quecrquill 429 Pessimism 251 Phantom of the Rose, The .... Jerome A. Hart ... 98 Plea for " Castles in the Air," A . . Jacob Gough .... 239 Poetic Mystery, The 24 Poetry and the Poor W. Walsham Bedford . 25 Poker 449 Poor Little Joe 340 Prairie Path, The 110 Prince of Peace, The 308 Promise 108 Pull-Back, A 433 Query, A 287 Rabbi's Present, The 432 Rain 108 Rain in the Heart 256 Rain on the Roof Coates Kinney ... 27 Rain upon the Roof, The .... Mrs. F. B. Gage ... 26 Rainy Day, A 173 Recipe for a Poem . 32 Rest 319 Rest 182 Rest at Eventide Thomas D'Arcy McGee 312 Rest in the Grave 315 Retribution David L. Proudfit . . 334 Retrospection Garnet B. Freeman . 270 Retrospection 187 Reunited Love R.D. Blackmore . . 131 Right and Wrong 260 Ring's Motto, The 151 Robin 's Come 01 Rocking the Baby 229 Rock of Ages -kk Roll-Call N.G. Shejard ... 406 Rosebud's First Ball Dg Rose-Bush, The . . 07 Sabbath Bells, The .'....'.'.'.'.' 296 Saddened Tramp, A ....... . 4^0 Saddest Fate, The ......'. 259 26 -50 PACK Sad Ventures . 359 Satisfied Hester A. Benedict . . . 269 Scandal-Mongers 390 Seaside Incident, A 436 Sea's Love, The F. E. Weatherly .... 132 Sermon in a Stocking, The 220 Shadows 284 Silence Lynch 238 Silence of Love, The Hamilton Drnmmond . . 157 Sister Madeleine Clare Everest 373 Slander 367 Somehow or Other 249 Sometime Airs* May Riley Smith . 234 Sometimes Louisa P. Story .... 163 Song for the Girl I Love, A 156 Song for the Hot Winds, A . . .

Harriet M. Davidson . . 219 Song for Summer, A Rossiter Johnson . . . 426 Songs in Sleep 211 'Spatially Jim B. AT. 433 Stone the Woman, Let the Man Go Free 396 Story of the Gate T. H. Robertson .... 149 Such a Duck 431 Summer Picture, A in Telegraph Clerk, The 384 Tete-a-tete 1 38 That Amateur Flute 449 That Boy 54 Thine Eyes John P. Ballantyne . . 154 This Year — Next Year 124 Though Lost to Sight, to Mem'ry Dear 361 Through Life 280 Through Toil A. L. Hinds 248 " Time to Me " 24S Tired 204 Tired Mothers Mrs. May Riley Smith . 225 Tired Out 272 Told at the Tavern Theo. P. Havens ... 332 To-morrow 348 Too Great a Sacrifice 43° To Thine Own Self be True . . Pakenham Beatty ... 302 Tragic Poem, A 439 Trailing Arbutus , Henry Abbey 101 Trout-Brook, The Carl Waring 119 Trust 393 Turned Out for Rent M. L. S. Burke .... 391 Turning Over the New Leaf 87 Twilight Dreams 200 Twilight Reverie, A 2I3 Twilight's Hour W.F. E.I. 199 Two 35° Two Men I Know 424 Two Pictures 2%l Two Robbers F.W. Bourdillon ... 313 Undowered Harriet McEwen Kimball 157 Unfinished Prayer, The • 53 Unfinished Still - !74 Unspoken Words 31 Upon the Threshold G. E. , , . . . - 85 PAGE Vagrant, A Josephine Pollard ... 175 Violet's Grave, The Vicortari 105 Wabash Violets Earl jVarble 394 Waiting z4° Wanderer, The John C. Fremont ... 180 Wanderer, The Eugene Field 108 Washing-Day 4° Watching for Papa 5° Water-Lilv, The 97 Water-Mill, The Sarah Doudncy Clarke . 395 Wedded 14° Welcome, Little Stranger 39 We Love but Few 156 We Shall be Satisfied S. K. Phillips 325 What Have I Done ?

Lillian Blanche Fearing . 283 What House to Like 272 What is His Creed? 301 What is Life ? 277 What Life Hath 235 What My Lover Said 126 What of That ? 260 What They Dreamed and Said . . M. E 108 When My Ship Comes in . . . Robert J. Burdettc . . . 237 When the Cows Come Home . . Airs. Agnes E. Mitchell . 205 " When the Frost is on the Punkin " James Whitcomb Riley . 117 When Will Love Come ? . . . . Pakenham Beatty . . . 123 Where Ignorance is Bliss 153 While We May 193 Who Gather Gold 290 Who'll Tend Baby? E. E 72 Why ? Maud Moore 73 Why Drink Wine Dr. Henry Aldrich . . . 442 Why Is It So? 282 Why Truth Goes Naked 422 Winter 113 Winter 113 With the Tide 281 Woman's Complaint, A 210 Woman's Wish, A Mary A. Townsend . . 212 Work 261 World and I, The 268 Yearning 202 Yellow-Hammer's Nest, The 95 " Yes " R. D. Blackmore .... 1 30 Yes? H. C. Bunner 141 Yesl George H.Jessop . . . 142 Zoology

PART I

<©f $oet£ anil $oetrp. If to embody in a breathing word Tones that the spirit trembled -when it heard ; To fix the image all unveiled and warm, And carve in language its ethereal form, So sure, so perfect, that the lines express No meagre shrinking, no unlaced excess ; To feel that art, in living truth, has taught Ourselves, reflected in the sculptured thought ; — If this alone bestow the right to claim The deathless garla fid and the sacred name; Then none arc poets, save the saints on high, Whose harps can murmur all that words deny. So every grace that plastic language knows To nameless foets its perfection owes. The rough-hewn words to simplest thoughts confined Were cut and polished in their nicer mind ; Caught on their edge, imagination's ray Splits into rainbows, shooting far away ; — From sense lo soul, from soul to sense, it files, And through all nature links analogies ; He who reads right will rarely look ufon A better foet than his lexicon. Oliver Wendell Holmes.

PART I.

<0f f&oetg anU $oetrp. AN INVOCATION TO POESY. Stay with me, Poesy ! playmate of childhood ! Friend of my manhood I delight of my youth ! Roamer with me over valley and wildwood, Searching for loveliness, groping for Truth. Stay with me, dwell with me, spirit of Poesy ; Dark were the world if thy bloom should depart ; Glory would cease in the sunlight and starlight, Freshness and courage would fade from my heart. Stay with me, comfort me, now more than ever, When years stealing over me lead me to doubt If men, ay, and women, are all we believed them When we two first wandered the green earth about I Stay with me, strengthen me, soother, adorner, Lest knowledge, not wisdom, should cumber my brain And tempt me to sit in the chair of the scorner, And say, with sad Solomon, all things are vain.

Stay with me, lend me thy magical mirror, Show me the darkness extinguished in light; Show me to-day's little triumph of Error Foiled by to-morrow's great triumph of Right ! Stay with me, nourish me, robe all creation In colors celestial of amber and blue ; Magnify littleness, glorify commonness, Pull down the false and establish the true. Stay with me, Poesy 1 Let me not stagnate I Despairing with fools, or believing with knaves, That men must be either the one or the other, — Victors or victims, oppressors or slaves] Stay with me, cling to me, while there is life in me ! Lead me, assist me, direct and control I Be in the shade what thou wert in the sunshine, Source of true happiness, light of my soul ! Charles Mackay. Belgravia. THE POETIC MYSTERY. (Suggested by "Alice in Wonderland.") " Poet, sit and sing to me ; Sing of how you make your rhymes, Tweedledum and tweedledee, I have tried it fifty times.

When I have a perfect sense, Then I have imperfect sounds ; Vice versa I Tell me whence You get both, I neither." " Zounds ! " Cried the poet, " Don't you see Easy 't is as rolling log, Holding eel or catching flea, Meeting friend or leaving grog I No such matter should annoy, Deep the poet never delves ; Take care of the sense, my boy, And the sounds care for themselves." »— NOCTURNE. (An Echo of Chopin.) "When we seek to explain our musical emotions, we look about for images calculated to excite similar emotions, and strive to convey through these images to others the effect produced by music on ourselves." — Haweis, Music and Morals. Wind, and the sound of a sea Heard in the night from afar, Spending itself on an unknown shore, Feeling its way o'er an unseen floor Lighted by moon nor star ; Telling a tale to the listening ear Of wounds and woes that the rolling year Hath brought to the human heart ; Telling of passion and innermost pain, Sinking and swooning, and growing again, As the wind and the waves take part ; Lifting a voice to the voiceless skies, Tender entreaties that faint for replies, Pauses of sorrow that pass into sighs Born of a secret despair ; Fluttering back on the clear tide of tone, Gathering in force till the melody 's grown Strong to interpret the accents unknown Haunting the dark fields of air; Speaking the longings of life, the full soul's Hidden desires in music that rolls Wave-like in search of a shore ; Eddies of harmony, floating around, Widen in circles of lessening sound, Die in the distance, till silence is found And earth redemands us once more.

All the Year Round. POETRY AND THE POOR. " The world is very beautiful ! " I said, As, yesterday, beside the brimming stream, Glad and alone, I watched the tremulous gleam Slant through the wintry wood, green carpeted With moss and fern and curving bramble spray, And bronze the thousand russet margin-reeds, And in the sparkling holly glint and play, And kindle all the brier's flaming seeds. " The world is very horrible ! " I sigh, As, in my wonted ways, to-day I tread Chill streets, deformed with dim monotony, Hiding strange mysteries of unknown dread, — The reeking court, the breathless fever-den, The haunts where things unholy throng and brood Grim crime, the fierce despair of strong-armed men, Child infamy, and shameless womanhood. And men have looked upon this piteous thing, — Blank lives unvisited by beauty's spell, — And said, " Let be : it is not meet to bring Dreams of sweet freedom to the prison cell ; Sing them no songs of things all bright and fair, Paint them no visions of the glad and free, Lest with purged sights their miseries they see, And through vain longings pass to blank despair."

O brother, treading ever-darkening ways, O sister, whelmed in ever-deepening care, Would God we might unfold before your gaze Some vision of the pure and true and fair ! Better to know, though sadder things be known, Better to see, though tears half blind the sight, Than thraldom to the sense, and heart of stone, And horrible contentment with the night. Oh, bring we then all sweet and gracious things To touch the lives that lie so chill and drear, That they may dream of some diviner sphere, Whence each soft ray of love and beauty springs 1 Each good and perfect gift is from above, And there is healing for earth's direst woes ; God hath unsealed the springs of light and love, To make the desert blossom as the rose. The Spectator. W. Walsham Bedford. — ♦ — THE RAIN UPON THE ROOF. Long ago a poet dreaming, Weaving fancy's warp and woof, Penned a tender, soothing poem On the " Rain upon the Roof."

Once I read it, and its beauty Filled my heart with memories sweet; Days of childhood fluttered round me, Violets sprang beneath my feet. And my gentle, loving mother Spoke again in accents mild, Curbing every wayward passion Of her happy, thoughtless child. Then I heard the swallows twittering Underneath the cabin eaves, And the laughing shout of Willie Up among the maple leaves. Then I blessed the poet's dreaming — Blessed his fancy's warp and woof, And I wept o'er memories treasured, As the rain fell on the roof. Years ago I lost the poem, But its sweetness lingered still, As the freshness of the valley Marks where flowed the springtime rill. Lost to reach, but not to feeling ; For the rain-drop never falls O'er my head with pattering music, But it peoples memory's halls With the old familiar faces Loved and treasured long ago, Treasured now as in life's springtime, — For no change my heart can know.

And I live again my childhood In the home far, far away ; Roam the woodland, orchard, wildwood, With my playmates still at play; Then my gray hairs press the pillow, Holding all the world aloof, Dreaming sweetly as I listen To the rain upon the roof. Every pattering drop that falleth Seemeth like an angel's tread, Bringing messages of mercy To the weary heart and head. Pleasant thoughts of years departed, Pleasant soothings for to-day, Earnest longings for to-morrow, Hoping for the far away ; For I know each drop that falleth Comes to bless the thirsty earth, Making seed to bud and blossom, Springing all things into birth. As the radiant bow that scattereth All our faithlessness with proof Of a seedtime and a harvest, So the rain upon the roof. Mrs. F. B. Gage. — ♦ — RAIN ON THE ROOF. When the humid shadows hover Over all the starry spheres, And the melancholy darkness Gently weeps in rainy tears, What a joy to press the pillow Of a cottage-chamber bed, And to listen to the patter Of the soft rain overhead I Every tinkle on the shingles Has an echo in the heart, And a thousand dreamy fancies Into busy being start ; And a thousand recollections Weave their air-threads into woof, As I listen to the patter Of the rain upon the roof.

Now in memory comes my mother As she used in years agone, To survey her darling dreamers Ere she left them till the dawn : Oh I I see her leaning o'er me, As I list to this refrain Which is played upon the shingles By the patter of the rain. Then my little seraph sister, With her wings and waving hair, And her bright-eyed cherub brother — A serene, angelic pair I — Glide around my wakeful pillow, With their praise or mild reproof, As 1 listen to the murmur Of the soft rain on the roof. And another comes to thrill me With her eyes' delicious blue; And forget I, gazing on her, That her heart was all untrue : I remember that I loved her As I ne'er may love again, And my heart's quick pulses vibrate To the patter of the rain. There is nought in art's bravuras That can work with such a spell In the spirit's pure deep fountains, Whence the holy passions swell, As that melody of Nature, That subdued, subduing strain, Which is played upon the shingles By the patter of the rain.

Coates Kinney. Note. — This charming poem was so long a vagrant that its text became very much corrupted until the author furnished a version for publication in which the last verse read as follows : — Art hath nought of tone or cadence That can work with such a spell In the soul's mysterious fountains, Whence the tears of rapture well, As that melody of Nature, That subdued, subduing strain, Which is played upon the shingles By the patter of the rain. It also contained several minor differences in reading from the original. Where considered improvements, they have been adopted; but as a poet's first_ thoughts are often his best thoughts, I have taken the liberty to follow original " copy" where it seemed to chime best with the patter of the rain. I was the more emboldened to do this by the fact that poets are proverbially unsafe revisers of their own work.1 William Cullen Bryant edited the life out of many of his younger passages, while Tennyson in later days has retouched the spirit and force out of some of his earlier work.

A DEED AND A WORD. A little stream had lost its way Amid the grass and fern ; A passing stranger scooped a well, Where weary men might turn ; He walled it in, and hung with care A ladle at the brink; He thought not of the deed he did, But judged that all might drink. He passed again, and lo ! the well, By summer never dried, Had cooled ten thousand parching tongues, And saved a life beside. A nameless man, amid a crowd That thronged the daily mart, Let fall a word of hope and love, Unstudied, from the heart ; A whisper on the tumult thrown, A transitory breath — It raised a brother from the dust, It saved a soul from death. O germ ! O fount ! O word of love ! O thought at random cast I Ye were but little at the first, But mighty at the last. Charles Mackay. 1 Here, on reading the note in manuscript, Mr. Francis F. Browne inter jected the query, "Zf it a fact?" and quoted the following verses from Gautier, as translated by Austin Dobson : — " O Poet ! then forbear The loosely-sandalled verse ; Choose rather thou to wear The buskin, straight and terse.