There is no Death! What seems so is trans

ition;

This life of mortal breath

Is but a suburb of the life elysian,
Whose portal we call Death.

She is not dead,—the child of our affection,But gone unto that school

Where she no longer needs our poor protection,

And Christ Himself doth rule.

In that great cloister's stillness and seclusion,
By guardian angels led,

Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution,
She lives, whom we call dead.

Not as a child shall we again behold her,
For when with raptures wild

In our embraces we again enfold her,
She will not be a child;

But a fair maiden, in her Father's mansion,
Clothed with celestial grace;

And beautiful with all the soul's expansion
Shall we behold her face.

And though at times, impetuous with emotion And anguish long suppressed,

The swelling heart heaves moaning like the

ocean,

That cannot be at rest,

We will be patient, and assuage the feeling

We may not wholly stay;

By silence sanctifying, not concealing,

The grief that must have way.

Longfellow.

THE OPEN WINDOW.

The old house by the lindens*
Stood silent in the shade,
And on the gravell'd pathway
The light and shadow played.

I saw the nursery windows
Wide open to the air!

But the faces of the children,
They were no longer there.

*Lime trees.

The large Newfoundland house-dog
Was standing by the door;
He looked for his little playmates,
Who would return no more.

They walked not under the lindens,
They played not in the hall;

But shadow, and silence, and sadness,
Were hanging over all.

The birds sang in the branches,
With sweet, familiar tone;

But the voices of the children
Will be heard in dreams alone!

And the boy that walked beside me,
He could not understand

Why closer in mine, ah! closer,
I pressed his warm, soft hand!

Longfellow.

A GLEAM OF SUNSHINE.

This is the place.

Stand still, my steed,

Let me review the scene,

And summon from the shadowy Past

The forms that once have been.

The Past and Present here unite
Beneath Time's flowing tide,
Like footprints hidden by a brook,
But seen on either side.

Here runs the highway to the town ;

There the green lane descends,

Through which I walked to church with thee, Oh, gentlest of my friends!

The shadow of the linden-trees
Lay moving on the grass;
Between them and the moving boughs,

A shadow, thou didst pass.

Thy dress was like the lilies,

And thy heart as pure as they; One of God's holy messengers

Did walk with me that day.

I saw the branches of the trees
Bend down thy touch to meet,
The clover-blossoms in the grass
Rise up to kiss thy feet.

"Sleep, sleep to-day, tormenting cares,
Of earth and folly born!"
Solemnly sang the village choir

On that sweet Sabbath morn.

Through the closed blinds the golden sun

Poured in a dusty beam,

Like the celestial ladder seen

By Jacob in his dream.

And ever and anon, the wind,

Sweet scented with the hay,

Turned o'er the hymn-book's fluttering leaves, That on the window lay.

*

But now, alas! the place seems changed;

Thou art no longer here;

Part of the sunshine of the scene

With thee did disappear.

Though thoughts, deep-rooted in my heart,

Like pine-trees dark and high,

Subdue the light of noon, and breathe
A low and ceaseless sigh;