The golden hours, on angel wings,
Flew o'er me and my dearie;
For dear to me as light and life,

Was my sweet Highland Mary.

3. With many a vow and locked embrace,
Our parting was full tender;
And pledging oft to meet again,
We tore ourselves asunder,

But, oh! fell death's untimely frost,

That nipt my flower so early!

Now green 's the sod and cold's the clay, '
That wraps my Highland Mary.

4. Oh! pale, pale now those rosy lips
I oft have kissed so fondly;
And closed for aye the sparkling glance,
That dwelt on me so kindly.

And moldering now in silent dust,
That heart that loved me dearly;
But still within my bosom's core
Shall live my Highland Mary!

BURNS

CCLVII. THE ROOK AND THE LARK.

1. "GOOD-NIGHT, Sir Rook," said a little Lark;
"The daylight fades, it will soon be dark;
I've bathed my wings in the sun's last ray,
I've sung my hymn to the dying day,
So now I haste to my quiet nook

In the dewy meadow: good-night, Sir Rook.”
2. "Good-night, poor Lark," said his titled friend,
With a haughty toss and a distant bend;
"I also go to my rest profound,

But not to sleep on the cold, damp ground;
The fittest place for a bird like me,
Is the topmost bough of the tall pine-tree.
3. "I opened my eyes at the peep of day,
And saw you taking your upward way,
Dreaming your fond romantic dreams,
An ugly speck in the sun's bright beams;
Soaring too high to be seen or heard-
And said to myself, what a foolish bird!

4. "I trod the park with a princely air;

I filled my crop with the richest fare;
I cawed all day 'mid a lordly crew,

And made more noise in the world than you!
The sun shone full on my ebon wing;

I looked and wondered; good-night, poor thing!"

5 "Good-night, once more," said the Lark's sweet voice,
"I see no cause to repent my choice;
You build your nest in the lofty pine,

But is your slumber more soft than mine?
You make more noise in the world than I,
But whose is the sweeter minstrelsy?"

CCLVIII.-THE OLD MAN DREAMS.

1. O, FOR One hour of youthful joy!

Give me back my twentieth spring!
I'd rather laugh a bright-haired boy
Than reign a gray-haired king!

2. Off with the wrinkled spoils of age!
Away with learning's crown!
Tear out life's wisdom-written page,
And dash its trophies down!

3. One moment let my life-blood stream
From boyhood's fount of flame!
Give me one giddy, reeling dream
Of life all love and fame!

4. My listening angel heard the prayer,
And, calmly smiling, said,
"If I but touch thy silvered hair,
Thy hasty wish hath sped.

5. "But is there nothing in thy track
To bid thee fondly stay,

While the swift seasons hurry back
To find the wished-for day?"

6. Ah! truest soul of womankind!
Without thee what were life?
One bliss I can not leave behind:

I'll take-my-precious-wife!

7. The angel took a sapphire pen
And wrote in rainbow dew,

"The man would be a boy again,
And be a husband, too!"

8. "And is there nothing yet unsaid
Before the change appears?
Remember, all their gifts have fled
With those dissolving years!"

9. "Why, yes; for memory would recall
My fond paternal joys;

I could not bear to leave them all:
I'll take-my-girls-and-boys!"

10. The smiling angel dropped his pen-
'Why, this will never do;

The man would be a boy again,

And be a father, too!"

11. And so I laughed—my laughter woke
The household with its noise-

And wrote my dream, when morning broke,
To please the gray-haired boys.

DR. HOLMES.

CCLIX.-THE SNIVELER.

1. ONE of the most melancholy productions of a morbid condition of life is the sniveler; a biped that infests all classes of society, and prattles, from the catechism of despair, on all subjects of human concern. The spring of his mind is broken. A babyish, nerveless fear has driven the sentiment of hope from his soul. He cringes to every phantom of apprehension, and obeys the impulses of cowardice, as though they were the laws of existence. He is the very Jeremiah of conventionalism, and his life one long and lazy lamentation. In connection with this maudlin brotherhood, his humble aim in life is, to superadd the snivelization of society to its civilization. Of all bores he is the most intolerable and merciless.

2. He drawls misery to you through his nose on all oc casions. He stops you at the corner of the street to intrust

you with his opinion on the probability, that the last measure of Congress will dissolve the Union. He fears, also, that the morals and intelligence of the people are destroyed by the election of some rogue to office. In a time of general health, he speaks of the pestilence that is to be. The mail can not be an hour late, but he prattles of railroad accidents and steamboat disasters. He fears that his friend who was married yesterday, will be a bankrupt in a year, and whimpers over the trials which he will then endure. As a citizen and politician, he has ever opposed every useful reform, and wailed over every rotten institution as it fell. He has been, and is, the foe of all progress, and always cries over the memory of the "good old days." In short, he is ridden with an eternal nightmare, emits an eternal wail.

E. P. WHIPPLE.

CCLX.--THE LAST FOOTFALL.

1. THERE is often sadness in the tone,
And a moisture in the eye,

And a trembling sorrow in the voice,
When we bid a last good-bye.

But sadder far than this, I ween,

O, sadder far than all,

Is the heart-throb with which we strain

To catch the last footfall.

2. The last press of a loving hand

Will cause a thrill of pain,

When we think, "Oh, should it prove that we

Shall never meet again."

And as lingeringly the hands unclasp,

The hot, quick drops will fall;

But bitterer are the tears we shed,
When we hear the last footfall.

3. We never felt how dear to us
Was the sound we loved full well,
We never knew how musical,
Till its last echo fell:

And till we heard it pass away
Far, far beyond recall,

We never thought what grief 't would be
To hear the last footfall.

4. And years and days that long are passed,
And the scenes that seemed forgot,
Rush through the mind like meteor-light
As we linger on the spot;

And little things that were as nought,

But now will be our all,

Come to us like an echo low

Of the last, the last footfall!

CCLXI.-VARIETIES.

1. THE MOUNTAINS OF LIFE.

1. THERE's a land far away, 'mid the stars, we are told, Where they know not the sorrows of time

Where the pure waters wander though valleys of gold,
And life is a treasure sublime;

'Tis the land of our God, 't is the home of the soul,
Where the ages of splendor eternally roll-
Where the way-weary traveler reaches his goal,
On the evergreen Mountains of Life.

2. Our gaze can not soar to that beautiful land,
But our visions have told of its bliss,

And our souls by the gale of its gardens are fanned,
When we faint in the desert of this;

And we some times have longed for its holy repose,
When our spirits were torn with temptations and woes,
And we 've drank from the tide of the river that flows
From the evergreen Mountains of Life.

3. O, the stars never tread the blue heavens at night,
But we think where the ransomed have trod;
And the day never smiles from his palace of light,
But we feel the bright smile of our God.

We are traveling homeward through changes and gloom,
To a kingdom where pleasures unceasingly bloom.
And our guide is the glory that shines through the tomb,
From the evergreen Mountains of Life.

J. G. CLARK