O, be swift, my soul, to answer him! be jubilant my feet!

Our God is marching on.

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the

sea,

With a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and

me;

As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men

free,

While God is marching on.

ABOU BEN ADHEM

BY LEIGH HUNT

Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich and like a lily in bloom,
An angel writing in a book of gold:
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the presence in the room he said,

"What writest thou?" The vision raised its head, And, with a look made of all sweet accord,

Answered, "The names of those who love the Lord."
"And is mine one?" said Abou. "Nay, not so,"
Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low,
But cheerly still; and said, "I pray thee, then,
Write me as one that loves his fellow-men."

The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night
It came again, with a great wakening light,

And showed the names whom love of God had blessed, —
And, lo! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest!

OUR FAME

BY JOHN A. JOYCE

A thousand years of glory

Shall immortalize our fame

With a tale in song and story

To keep green the hallowed name,
Of the victor and the vanquished
On the land and on the sea,
A band of noble brothers

Led by gallant Grant and Lee.
And the tears of beaming beauty
Shall freshen every flower
In the May-time of our duty,

Through the sunlit, fleeting hour.
Then we'll strew the rarest roses

O'er the graves we bless to-day,

And we'll pluck the purest posies

To enwreath the "Blue" and "Gray.”

And down the circling ages,

From the father to the son,

We'll tell on golden pages

How the field was lost and won;

And how a band of brothers

Fought each other hard and true

To bind the Union arches

O'er the "Gray " and o'er the "Blue," And rearing a lasting temple

So complete in every plan, To justice, truth, and mercy And the liberty of man!

FANCY

BY JOHN KEATS

Ever let the Fancy roam,
Pleasure never is at home:

At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth,
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth;

Then let winged Fancy wander

Through the thought still spread beyond her

Open wide the mind's cage-door,

She'll dart forth, and cloudward soar.

O sweet Fancy! let her loose;
Summer's joys are spoilt by use,
And the enjoying of the Spring
Fades as does its blossoming.
Autumn's red-lipped fruitage too,
Blushing through the mist and dew,
Cloys with tasting. What do then?
Sit thee by the ingle, when
The sear fagot blazes bright,

Spirit of a winter's night;

When the soundless earth is muffled,

And the caked snow is shuffled
From the ploughboy's heavy shoon;

When the Night doth meet the Noon
In a dark conspiracy

To banish Even from her sky.

Sit thee there, and send abroad
With a mind self-overawed

Fancy, high-commissioned: - send her!
She has vassals to attend her;
She will bring, in spite of frost,
Beauties that the earth hath lost;
She will bring thee, all together,
All delights of summer weather;
All the buds and bells of May
From dewy sward or thorny spray;

All the heaped Autumn's wealth,
With a still, mysterious stealth;
She will mix these pleasures up
Like three fit wines in a cup,

And thou shalt quaff it; · thou shalt hear
Distant harvest-carols clear;

Rustle of the reaped corn;

Sweet birds antheming the morn;

And in the same moment - hark!

"T is the early April lark,

Or the rooks, with busy caw,
Foraging for sticks and straw.
Thou shalt, at one glance, behold
The daisy and the marigold;
White-plumed lilies, and the first
Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst;
Shaded hyacinth, alway

Sapphire queen of the mid-May;
And every leaf, and every flower
Pearled with the self-same shower.
Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep
Meagre from its cellèd sleep;
And the snake all winter-thin
Cast on sunny bank its skin;
Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see
Hatching in the hawthorn tree,
When the hen-bird's wing doth rest
Quiet on her mossy nest;

Then the hurry and alarm
When the bee-hive casts its swarm;
Acorns ripe down-pattering
While the autumn breezes sing.

O sweet Fancy! let her loose;
Everything is spoilt by use:

Where's the cheek that doth not fade,

Too much gazed at? Where's the maid

Whose lip mature is ever new?

Where's the eye, however blue,

Doth not weary? Where's the face
One would meet in every place?
Where's the voice, however soft,
One would hear so very oft?

At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth.
Let then winged Fancy find
Thee a mistress to thy mind:
Dulcet-eyed as Ceres' daughter,