The fair each moment rises in her charms,
Repairs her smiles, awakens every grace,
And calls forth all the wonders of her face,
Sees by degrees a purer blush arise,
And keener lightnings quicken in her eyes.
The busy sylphs surround their darling care;
These set the head, and those divide the hair,
Some fold the sleeve, while others plait the

gown,

And Betty's praised for labors not her own. ALEXANDER POPE.

THE COURTIN'.

OD makes such nights all white an' still
Fur'z you can look or listen,

Moonshine an' snow on field an' hill,
All silence an' all glisten.

Zekle crep' up quite unbeknown
An' peeked in thru' the winder,

An' thar sot Huldy all alone,

'Ith no one nigh to hender.

A fire-place filled the room's one side,
With half a cord o' wood in ;

There warn't no stoves, tell comfort died,
To bake ye to a puddin'.

The wa'nut logs shot sparkles out
Towards the pootiest, bless her,
An' leetle flames danced all about
The chiny on the dresser.

Agin the chimbly crook-necks hung,
An' in among 'em rusted

The old queen arm that granther Young
Fetched back from Concord busted.

The very room, coz she was in,
Seemed warm from floor to ceilin',
An' she looked full ez rosy agin

Ez the apples she was peelin'.
'Twas kin' o' kingdom-come to look
On such a blessed creetur;
A dog-rose blushin' to a brook
Ain't modester nor sweeter.

He was six foot o' man, A 1,

Clear grit an' human natur'; None couldn't quicker pitch a ton, Nor dror a furrer straighter.

He'd sparked it with full twenty gals, He'd squired 'em, danced 'em, druv 'em,

Fust this one, an' then thet, by spells;
All is, he couldn't love 'em.

But long o' her his veins would run
All crinkly like curled maple;
The side she breshed felt full o' sun
Ez a south slope in Ap'il.

She thought no v'ice had such a swing
Ez his'n in the choir;

My! when he made Old Hundered ring,
She knowed the Lord was nigher.

An' she'd blushed scarlet, right in prayer
When her new meetin' bonnet
Felt somehow thru' its crown a pair
O' blue eyes sot upon it.

Thet night, I tell ye, she looked some!
She seemed to've gut a new soul,
For she felt sarten sure he'd come,
Down to her very shoe-sole.

She heered a foot, an' knowed it tu,
A-rasping on the scraper;
All ways to once her feelin's flew

Like sparks in burnt-up paper.

He kin' o' l'itered on the mat,

Some doubtfle of the sekle; His heart kep' goin' pity pat, But hern went pity Zekle.

An' yit she gin her cheer a jerk

Ez though she wished him furder, An' on her apples kept to work, Parin' away like murder.

"You want to see my Pa, I s'pose?" "Wal, no; I come designin” ”— "To see my Ma? She's sprinklin' clothes Agin to-morrow's i'nin'."

To say why gals acts so or so,

Or don't, would be presumin'; Mebby to mean yes an' say no Comes nateral to women.

He stood a spell on one foot fust, Then stood a spell on t'other, An' on which one he felt the wust

He couldn't ha' told you nuther.

Says he," I'd better call again."

Says she, "Think likely, Mister." Thet last word pricked him like a pin, An'-wal, he up an' kissed her.

When Ma bimeby upon em' slips,

And I'd speak had I courage to speak, But her forte's to evaluate л.

Huldy sat pale ez ashes, All kin' o' smiley round the lips, An' teary round the lashes.

For she was jes' the quiet kind

Whose naturs never vary,

Like streams that keep a summer mind Snow-hid in Janooary.

"You men are savage through and through. A boy is always bringing in

Some string of bird's eggs, white and blue, Or butterflies upon a pin.

The angle worm in anguish dies,

Impaled, the pretty trout to tease-" "My own, we fish for trout with flies" "Don't wander from the question, please!"

She quoted Burns' "Wounded Hare,"
And certain burning lines of Blake's,
And Ruskin on the fowls of air,
And Coleridge on the water snakes.
At Emerson's "Forbearance" he
Began to feel his will benumbed;
At Browning's "Donald" utterly
His soul surrendered and succumbed.

"O gentlest of all gentle girls,"

He thought, "beneath the blessed sun!" He saw her lashes hung with pearls, And swore to give away his gun. She smiled to find her point was gained, And went with happy, parting words (He subsequently ascertained)

To trim her hat with humming birds. HELEN GRAY CONE.

MY AUNT.

Y aunt! my dear unmarried aunt! Long years have o'er her flown; Yet still she strains the aching clasp That binds her virgin zone;

I know it hurts her, though she looks
As cheerful as she can;
Her waist is ampler than her life,
For life is but a span.

My aunt! my poor deluded aunt!
Her hair is almost gray;
Why will she train that winter curl
In such a springlike way?
How can she lay her glasses down,

And say she reads as well,
When through a double convex lens,
She just makes out to spell ?

Her father-grandpapa, forgive
This erring lip its smiles!-
Vowed she should make the finest girl
Within a hundred miles;

He sent her to a stylish school;

'Twas in her thirteenth June; And with her, as the rules required, "Two towels and a spoon."

Were in my fowling-piece and filly; In short, while I was yet a boy, I fell in love with Laura Lilly.

I saw her at the Country Ball:

There when the sounds of flute and fiddle Gave signal sweet in that old hall,

Of hands across and down the middle, Hers was the subtlest spell by far

Of all that sets young hearts romancing: She was our queen, our rose, our star; And then she danced-oh, heaven, her dancing!

Dark was her hair, her hand was white;
Her voice was exquisitely tender,
Her eyes were full of liquid light;

I never saw a waist so slender;
Her every look, her every smile,

Shot right and left a score of arrows; I thought 'twas Venus from her isle, And wondered where she'd left her spar

rows.

She talked of politics or prayers

Of Southey's prose, or Wordsworth's sonnets,

Of danglers or of dancing bears,

Of battles, or the last new bonnets;
By candle-light, at twelve o'clock,
To me it matter'd not a tittle,

If those bright lips had quoted Locke,
I might have thought they murmured
Little.

Through sunny May, through sultry June, I loved her with a love eternal;

I spoke her praises to the moon,

I wrote them to the Sunday Journal. My mother laughed; I soon found out That ancient ladies have no feeling; My father frown'd; but how should gout See any happiness in kneeling?

She was the daughter of a dean,—

Rich, fat, and rather apoplectic; She had one brother just thirteen, Whose color was extremely hectic; Her grandmother, for many a year, Had fed the parish with her bounty; Her second cousin was a peer,

And lord-lieutenant of the county. But titles and the three per cents,

And mortgages, and great relations,

And India bonds, and tithes and rents,

Oh! what are they to love's sensations? Black eyes, fair forehead, clustering locks, Such wealth, such honors Cupid chooses; He cares as little for the stocks,

As Baron Rothschild for the muses.

She sketch'd! the vale, the wood, the beach, Grew lovelier from her pencil's shading; She botanized; I envied each

Young blossom in her boudoir fading; She warbled Handel; it was grandShe made the Catalina jealous;

She touched the organ; I could stand

For hours and hours to blow the bellows.

She kept an album, too, at home,

Well filled with all an album's glories; Paintings of butterflies and Rome,

Patterns for trimmings, Persian stories;

Soft songs to Julia's cockatoo,

Fierce odes to famine and to slaughter; And autographs of Prince Leboo, And recipes of elder water.

And she was flatter'd, worship'd, bored; Her steps were watched, her dress was noted,

Her poodle dog was quite adored,

Her sayings were extremely quoted.
She laugh'd, and every heart was glad,
As if the taxes were abolished;
She frown'd, and every look was sad,
As if the opera were demolished.

She smil❜d on many just for fun,—

I knew that there was nothing in it; I was the first, the only one

Her heart had thought of for a minute; I knew it, for she told me so,

In phrase which was divinely moulded;
She wrote a charming hand, and oh!
How sweetly all her notes were folded!

Our love was like most other loves,―
A little glow, a little shiver;
A rosebud and a pair of gloves,

And "Fly Not Yet," upon the river;
Some jealousy of some one's heir,

Some hopes of dying broken-hearted, A miniature, a lock of hair,

The usual vows-and then we parted.

We parted-months and years roll'd by; We met again four summers after;