SPARGE ROSAS.

Sparge rosas: sprinkle roses

Thus Venusia's minstrel taught Where each loving heart reposes, Where its sweetest joys are sought.

Sparge rosas: scatter roses

Round the dancer's flying feet. They are Venus' chosen symbol, 'Mid the halls where graces meet.

Sparge rosas: crown with roses Every head at friendship's feast;

Sparge rosas: sprinkle roses;
Be their sweetest odor shed-
Pledge of faithful, fond affection-
Round the sacred bridal bed.

Sparge rosas: sprinkle roses
All along the weary way;
Earth's a desert; scarce reposes
On its waste a kindly ray.

Sparge rosas: sprinkle roses;
Thorns enough spontaneous grow:
Comfort needeth cultivation;

Pain and hardship all shall know.

Sparge rosas: sprinkle roses,
Roses sweet of peace and love;
Hate and discard strive to banish,
Strive to good the race to move.

Sparge rosas: sprinkle roses

O'er the silvered brow of age; Let the last of earth they witness Be their life's serenest page.

Sparge rosas: sprinkle roses
O'er the corpse of tender age;
Sprinkle roses, now decaying,
O'er the seventy winters' sage.

Sparge rosas: sprinkle roses,
That dispel the mournful gloom
That around the spirit hovers,
As we gaze upon the tomb.

PASSING AWAY.

It is written on the rose,

In its glory's full array ·

Read what those buds disclose

"Passing away."

It is written on the skies

Of the soft blue summer day;

It is traced in sunset's dyes

"Passing away."

It is written on the trees,

As their young leaves glistening play,

And on brighter things than these

It is written on the brow

"Passing away."

Where the spirit's ardent ray

Lives, burns, and triumphs now -

"Passing away."

It is written on the heart

Alas! that there decay

Should claim from love a part —

"Passing away."

Friends, friends! -O, shall we meet

In a land of purer day,

Where lovely things, and sweet,

Pass not away?

Shall we know each other's eyes,
And the thoughts that in them lay,
When the mingled sympathies -

WHEN summer's sunny hues adorn
Sky, forest, hill, and meadow,
The foliage of the evergreens,
In contrast, seems a shadow.

But when the tints of autumn have
Their sober reign asserted,

The landscape that cold shadow shows

Into a light converted.

Thus thoughts that frown upon our mirth

Will smile upon our sorrow,

And many dark fears of to-day

May be bright hopes to-morrow.

WITHERED LEAVES.

How sad it is in autumn

To watch the flowers decay,
As one by one the faded leaves
Drop from the stalk away!
The breezes murmur plaintively
'Mid the branches of the trees,
Sighing a dirge-like melody
Over the withered leaves.

From the sapling to the oak-tree,
All, all their leaves must shed :
In the fields and in the gardens,
They are lying sear and dead.
O, pass them not unheeded,

But learn, while yet you may,
The sweetly solemn messages
They silently convey.

The heart knows many an autumn
Its brightest hopes decay,

Like flowers that bloom in summer,

Then quickly pass away.

The lovely visions vanished,

O'er which the fond heart grieves

The treasured ones departed—

These are our withered leaves.