GOLDILOCKS.

Can its embers burn below
All that chill December snow?
Care you still soft hands to press,
Bonny heads to smooth and bless?

When does Love give up the chase?
Tell, oh, tell me, Grizzled-Face!
"Ah!" the wise old lips reply,

"Youth may pass and strength may die;

But of Love I can't foretoken:

Ask some older sage than I!"

EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN.

G

Goldilocks.

OLDILOCKS sat on the grass,

Tying up of posies rare :

Hardly could a sunbeam pass

Through the cloud that was her hair. Purple orchis lasteth long,

Primrose flowers are pale and clear ;

Oh, the maiden sang a song
It would do you good to hear!

Sad before her leaned the boy,
"Goldilocks that I love well,
Happy creature fair and coy,

Think o' me, sweet Amabel."
Goldilocks she shook apart,

Looked with doubtful, doubtful eyes:
Like a blossom in her heart,
Opened out her first surprise.

As a gloriole sign o' grace,
Goldilocks, ah, fall and flow;
On the blooming, childlike face,
Dimple, dimple, come and go.

7

Give her time: on grass and sky

Let her gaze if she be fain,
As they looked ere he drew nigh,
They will never look again.

Ah! the playtime she has known,
While her goldilocks grew long,
Is it like a nestling flown,

Childhood over like a song?
Yes, the boy may clear his brow,
Though she thinks to say him nay,
When she sighs, "I cannot now.

Come again some other dav."

JEAN INGELOW.

"Where the Brook and River meet.”

M

Y maiden visions curb their airy flights,

And droop their pinions and come back to me; That first fair world, with all its young delights And morning hopes, they can no longer see.

My girlhood's world lies lost beneath the flood
Of light, bright days that fell like silver rain,
Swollen from the fountains of my womanhood,
Now broken up, not to be sealed again.

But lo! another world, as fair, more calm,
Arisen like Delos, floats upon the wave;

I bare my brow to breezes blowing balm,

And smile, through tears, above my girlhood's grave.

A tender longing, full of gracious pain,

A want more rich than wealth possessed before, Delicious rumors rife in heart and brain,

And rosy warmths that flush me more and more :

BLUE-BEARD.

A sense of incompleteness, new and strange,

Something that draws me toward support, beside A hundred nameless heraldries of change

Forewarn me of a chance that may betide.

I watch to meet an eye I have not met;

I hearken for a voice I have not heard;
I tremble toward a touch that hath not yet
The dreaming blood's expectant pulses stirred.

Sometimes a look will startle, or a tone;

A touch sometimes half seem to shake my heart; A moment then alone is more alone,

And fates were sweet together, not apart.

Yet well content with blessed discontent

I dream my dream, nor care to waken soon;
The dream bides fair, though fairer far be meant,
Let the white dawn delay the golden noon.

So watch, my heart, and let me dream my dream;
Watch and awake me when the time shall come;
Perhaps our prince is nearer than we deem,

But greet him thou - my dream may make me dumb.

WILLIAM C. WILKINSON.

H

Blue-Beard.

E is not dead, for I am he!

Nay, little one, you need not start;

That awful closet is my heart,

I pray you not to turn the key.

You hold the matter in suspense,

You hesitate, ah! all is lost;

The key is turned, the threshold crossed,

Now you must take the consequence.

9

Seven dead loves you bring to view
No wonder that you stood aghast ;
You should not dive into the past
If you would trust that men are true.

Seven dead loves! a heavy load.
You see the first, a little girl
With violet eyes and teeth of pearl;
That was a school-boy episode.

When college days gave life a glow,
And tender hearts wrought rapid slaughter,
I courted the Professor's daughter;
That's she-the second in the row.

I scarcely know how it occurred;
I spent vacation with a friend,

And ere three weeks were at an end
I loved his sister - she's the third.

A grim old lawyer taught me Kent;
I made his mansion my abode,

And spoke some words not in the "Code"His youngest girl knew what they meant.

When Fashion's flame was all alive,
Where pleasure flung her golden haze
Athwart the pathway of the days,
I met and worshiped Number Five.

But yonder, where the maple-tree
Casts shadows on the old stone wall,
And slumberous peace broods over all,
A village maid enraptured me.

You see one other figure stand,

Her memory will forever last;
I hold her sacred since she passed
The portals of the Silent Land.

SERENADE.

So Blue-Beard lives, and I am he:
But come, Fatima, close the door,
You cannot love me any more;

The blood of knowledge stains the key.

II