THE FIFTIETH BIRTHDAY OF

AGASSIZ.

MAY 28, 1857.

IT was fifty years ago,

In the pleasant month of May, In the beautiful Pays de Vaud, A child in its cradle lay.

And Nature, the old nurse, took
The child upon her knee,
Saying, "Here is a story-book
Thy Father has written for thee."

"Come, wander with me," she said,
"Into regions yet untrod,
And read what is still unread
In the manuscripts of God."
And he wandered away and away,
With Nature, the dear old nurse,
Who sang to him night and day
The rhymes of the universe.
And whenever the way seemed long,
Or his heart began to fail,

She would sing a more wonderful song,

Or tell a more marvellous tale.

So she keeps him still a child,
And will not let him go,
Though at times his heart beats
wild

For the beautiful Pays de Vaud;

Though at times he hears in his dreams

The Ranz des Vaches of old, And the rush of mountain streams From glaciers clear and cold;

And the mother at home says, "Hark!

For his voice I listen and yearn: It is growing late and dark, And my boy does not return!" LONGFELLOW.

THE WANTS OF MAN.

"MAN wants but little here below, Nor wants that little long."

'Tis not with me exactly so; But 'tis so in the song.

And as Time's car incessant runs,
And fortune fills my store,

I want of daughters and of sons
From eight to half a score.
I want (alas! can mortal dare
Such bliss on earth to crave?)
That all the girls be chaste and fair,
The boys all wise and brave.

I want a warm and faithful friend,
To cheer the adverse hour;
Who ne'er to flattery will descend,
Nor bend the knee to power,

A friend to chide me when I'm wrong,
My inmost soul to see;

And that my friendship prove as strong

For him as his for me.

I want the seals of power and place,
The ensigns of command;
Charged by the People's unbought
grace

To rule my native land.

Nor crown nor sceptre would I ask,
But from my country's will,
By day, by night, to ply the task
Her cup of bliss to fill.

I want the voice of honest praise
To follow me behind,

And to be thought in future days
The friend of human kind,
That after ages, as they rise,
Exulting may proclaim

In choral union to the skies
Their blessings on my name.

These are the wants of mortal man,
I cannot want them long;
For life itself is but a span,
And earthly bliss - a song.
My last great want, absorbing all-
Is, when beneath the sod,
And summoned to my final call,
The "mercy of my God."

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS. WASHINGTON, Aug. 31, 1841.

LINES WRITTEN IN A LADY'S ALBUM BELOW THE AUTOGRAPH OF JOHN ADAMS.

DEAR lady, I a little fear 'Tis dangerous to be writing here. His hand who bade our eagle fly, Trust his young wings, and mount the sky,

Who bade across the Atlantic tide New thunders sweep, new navies

ride,

Has traced in lines of trembling

age

His autograph upon this page.
Higher than that eagle soars,
Wider than that thunder roars,
His fame shall through the world be
sounding,

And o'er the waves of time be bounding.

Though thousands as obscure as I, Cling to his skirts, he still will fly And leap to immortality.

If by his name I write my own, He'll take me where I am not known, The cold salute will meet my ear, "Pray, stranger, how did you come here?"

DANIEL WEBSTER.

A KING lived long ago,

In the morning of the world, When Earth was nigher Heaven than now:

And the King's locks curled Disparting o'er a forehead full As the milk-white space 'twixt horn and horn

Of some sacrificial bull.

Only calm as a babe new-born: For he was got to a sleepy mood,

So safe from all decrepitude, Age with its bane so sure gone by, (The gods so loved him while he dreamed,)

That, having lived thus long, there seemed

No need the King should ever die.

Among the rocks his city was; Before his palace, in the sun, He sat to see his people pass,

And judge them every one From its threshold of smooth stone

ROBERT BROWNING.

THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB.

THE Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,

And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;

And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green,

That host with their banners at sunset were seen:

Like the leaves of the forest when autumn hath blown,

That host on the morrow lay withered and strewn.

For the Angel of Death spread his wing on the blast,

And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;

And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,

And their hearts but once heaved, and forever grew still.

And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,

But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride;

And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,

And cold as the spray of the rockbeating surf.

And there lay the rider distorted and pale,

With the dew on his brow, and the

rust on his mail;

And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,

The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.

And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,

And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;

And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword, Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

BYRON.

CLEOPATRA.

THE barge she sat in, like a burnished throne,

Burned on the water: the poop was beaten gold,

Purple the sails, and so perfumèd, that

The winds were love-sick with them: the oars were silver;

Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made

The water, which they beat, to follow faster,

As amorous of their strokes. For her own person,

It beggared all description: she did lie

In her pavilion, (cloth-of-gold, of tissue,)

O'er-picturing that Venus, where we see,

The fancy out-work nature: on each side her,

Stood pretty boys, like smiling Cupids,

With diverse-colored fans, whose wind did seem

To glow the delicate cheeks which they did cool

And what they undid, did. Her gentlewomen, like the Nereides.

So many mermaids, tended her i'

the eyes,

And made their bends adornings: at the helm

A seeming mermaid steers; the silken tackles

Swell with the touches of those

flower-soft hands,

That yarely frame the office. From the barge

A strange invisible perfume hits the

sense

Of the adjacent wharfs. The city

cast

Her people out upon her; and Antony,

Enthroned in the market-place, did sit alone,

Whistling to the air; which, but for

vacancy,

Had gone to gaze on Cleopatra too,

And made a gap in nature.

SHAKSPEARE.