"I looked no more for it, I do declare,
Than the Great Bear!

As sure as Tycho Brahe is dead,
It really entered in my head
No more than Berenice's hair!”

Thus musing, heaven's grand inquisitor

Sat gazing on the uninvited visitor,

Till John, the serving man, came to the upper Regions, with "Please your honor, come to supper."

"Supper! good John, to-night I shall not sup, Except on that phenomenon,-look up.”

"Not sup!" cried John, thinking with consternation That supping on a star must be star-vation, Or even to batten

On ignes fatui would never fatten.

His visage seemed to say, "that very odd is,"
But still his master the same tune ran on,
"I can't come down; go to the parlor, John,
And say I'm supping with the heavenly bodies."

"The heavenly bodies!" echoed John, "alem!"
His mind still full of famishing alarms,
"Zounds! if your honor sups with them,

In helping, somebody must make long arms."
He thought his master's stomach was in danger,
But still in the same tone replied the knight,
“Go down, John, go, I have no appetite;
Say I'm engaged with a celestial stranger."
Quoth John, not much au fait in such affairs,
Wouldn't the stranger take a bit down stairs?"

"No," said the master, smiling, and no wonder, At such a blunder,

"The stranger is not quite the thing you think;
He wants no meat or drink;

And one may doubt quite reasonably whether
He has a mouth,

Seeing his head and tail are joined together.

Behold him! there he is, John, in the south."
John looked up with his portentous eyes,
Each rolling like a marble in its socket;

At last the fiery tadpole spies,

And, full of Vauxhall reminiscence, cries, "A rare good rocket!"

"A what? A rocket, Jolin! Far from it! What you behold, John, is a comet;

One of those most eccentric things

That in all ages

Have puzzled sages

And frightened kings;

With fear of change, that flaming meteor, John,
Perplexes sovereigns throughout its range."
"Do he ?" cried John;

"Well, let him flare on,

I haven't got no sovereigns to change!”

Thomas Hood.

TWENTY YEARS AGO.

I've wandered to the village, Tom, I've sat beneath the tree, Upon the school-house play-ground, that sheltered you and me; But none were left to greet me, Tom; and few were left to know,

Who played with us upon the green, some twenty years ago.

The grass is just as green. Tom; bare-footed boys at play Were sporting, just as we did then, with spirits just as gay, But the "master" sleeps upon the hill, which, coated o'er with

snow,

Afforded us a sliding-place, some twenty years ago.

The old school-house is altered now; the benches are replaced By new ones, very like the same our penknives once defaced; But the same old bricks are in the wall, the bell swings to and

fro;

Its music's just the same, dear Tom, 'twas twenty years ago.

The boys were playing some old game, beneath that same old tree;

I have forgot the name just now,-you've played the same with me,

On that same spot; 'twas played with knives, by throwing so and so;

The loser had a task to do,-there, twenty years ago.

The river's running just as still; the willows on its side
Are larger than they were, Tom; the stream appears less wide;
But the grape-vine swing is ruined now, where once we played

the beau,

And swung our sweethearts,-pretty girls,-just twenty years

ago.

The spring that bubbled 'neath the hill, close by the spreading beech,

Is very low,-'twas then so high that we could scarcely reach;
And, kneeling down to get a drink, dear Tom, I started so,
To see how sadly I am changed, since twenty years ago.

Near by that spring, upon an elm, you know I cut your name,
Your sweetheart's just beneath it, Tom, and you did mine the

same;

Some heartless wretch has peeled the bark, 'twas dying sure but slow,

Just as she died, whose name you cut, some twenty years ago.

My lids have long been dry, Tom, but tears came to my eyes;
I thought of her I loved so well, those early broken ties;
I visited the old church-yard, and took some flowers to strow
Upon the graves of those we loved, some twenty years ago.

Some are in the church-yard laid, some sleep beneath the sea;
But few are left of our old class, excepting you and me:
And when our time shall come, Tom, and we are called to go,
I hope they'll lay us where we played, just twenty years ago.

GOING OUT AND COMING IN.

Going out to fame and triumph,
Going out to love and light,

Coming in to pain and sorrow,

Coming in to gloom and night.

Going out with joy and gladness,
Coming in with woe and sin;

Ceaseless streams of restless pilgrims
Going out and coming in.

Through the portals of the homestead,
From beneath the blooming vine,
To the trumpet tones of glory,
Where the bays and laurels twine;
From the loving home caresses
To the chill voice of the world,
Going out with gallant canvass
To the summer breeze unfurled.

Coming back all worn and weary,
Weary with the world's cold breath;
Coming to the dear old homestead,
Coming in to age and death;

Weary of all empty flattery,
Weary of all ceaseless din,
Weary of its heartless sneering;
Coming from the bleak world in.

Going out with hopes of glory,
Coming in with sorrow dark;
Going out with sails all flying,

Coming in with mastless barque;
Restless stream of pilgrims, striving,
Wreaths of fame or love to win;
From the doorways of the homesteads
Going out and coming in.

Mollie E. Moore

THE LEPER.

Day was breaking,

When at the altar of the temple stood

The holy priest of God. The incense lamp

Burned with a struggling light, and a low chant

Swelled through the hollow arches of the roof,
Like an articulate wail; and there, alone,

Wasted to ghastly thinness, Helon knelt.

The echoes of the melancholy strain

Died in the distant aisles, and he rose up,

Struggling with weakness, and bowed down his head

Unto the sprinkled ashes, and put off

His costly raiment for the leper's garb,

And with the sackcloth round him, and his lip
Hid in a loathsome covering, stood still,

Waiting to hear his doom :

"Depart! depart, O child

Of Israel, from the temple of thy God!

For he has smote thee with his chastening rod,
And to the desert wild,

From all thou lov'st, away thy feet must flee,
That from thy plague his people may be free.

"Depart! and come not near

The busy mart, the crowded city, more;
Nor set thy foot a human threshold o'er;
And stay thou not to hear

Voices that call thee in the way; and fly
From all who in the wilderness pass by.

"Wet not thy burning lip

In streams that to a human dwelling glide;
Nor rest thee where the covert fountains hide;
Nor kneel thee down to dip

The water where the pilgrim bends to drink,
By desert well, or river's grassy brink.

"And pass not thou between

The weary traveller and the cooling breeze;
And lie not down to sleep beneath the trees
Where human tracks are seen;

Nor milk the goat that browseth on the plain;
Nor pluck the standing corn, or yellow grain.

"And now depart! and when

Thy heart is heavy, and thine eyes are dim,
Lift up thy prayer beseechingly to him
Who, from the tribes of men,

Selected thee to feel his chastening rod;—
Depart, O leper! and forget not God."

And he went forth alone. Not one of all
The many whom he loved, nor she whose name
Was woven in the fibres of the heart

Breaking within him now, to come and speak
Comfort unto him. Yea, he went his way,-
Sick, and heart-broken, and alone,-to die!
For God had cursed the leper.

It was noon,
And Helon knelt beside a stagnant pool
In the lone wilderness, and bathed his brow,
Hot with the burning leprosy, and touched
The loathsome water to his fevered lips,
Praying he might be so blest,-to die!

Footsteps approached, and with no strength to flee,
He drew the covering closer on his lip,

Crying, "Unclean! unclean!" and in the folds
Of the coarse sackcloth shrouding up his face,
He fell upon the earth till they should pass.
Nearer the stranger came, and bending o'er
The leper's prostrate form, pronounced his name,
"Helon!" The voice was like the master-tone
Of a rich instrument,-most strangely sweet;
And the dull pulses of disease awoke,
And for a moment beat beneath the hot
And leprous scales with a restoring thrill.
"Helon, arise!" And he forgot his curse,
And rose and stood before him.

Love and awe

Mingled in the regard of Helon's eye,