OVER the river they beckon to me

Loved ones who've passed to the further side; The gleam of their snowy robes I see,

But their voices are lost in the dashing tide. There's one with ringlets of sunny gold,

And eyes the reflection of heaven's own blue;
He crossed in the twilight gray and cold,

And the pale mist hid him from mortal view;
We saw not the angels who met him there,
The gates of the city we could not see-
Over the river, over the river,

My brother stands waiting to welcome me!

Over the river the boatman pale

Carried another, the household pet; Her brown curls waved in the gentle galeDarling Minnie! I see her yet.

She crossed on her bosom her dimpled hands, And fearlessly entered the phantom bark; We felt it glide from the silver sands,

And all our sunshine grew strangely dark; We know she is safe on the further side, Where all the ransomed and angels beOver the river, the mystic river,

My childhood's idol is waiting for me.

For none return from those quiet shores,
Who cross with the boatman cold and pale;
We hear the dip of the golden oars,

And catch a gleam of the snowy sail;

And lo! they have passed from our yearning heart,
They cross the stream and are gone for aye;
We may not sunder the veil apart

That hides from our vision the gates of day
We only know that their barks no more
May sail with us o'er life's stormy sea,
Yet, somewhere, I know, on the unseen shore,
They watch, and beckon, and wait for me.
And I sit and think, when the sunset's gold
Is flushing river and hill and shore,

I shall one day stand by the water cold
And list for the sound of the boatman's oar;

I shall watch for a gleam of the flapping sail,
I shall hear the boat as it gains the strand;

I shall pass from sight with the boatman pale,
To the better shore of the spirit land.

I shall know the loved who have gone before,
And joyfully sweet will the meeting be,
When over the river, the peaceful river,
The Angel of Death shall carry me.

NANCY PRIEST WAKEFIELD.

HORACE GREELEY.

HE One remains, the many change and pass; Heaven's light forever shines, Earth's shadows fly;

Life, like a dome of many-colored glass, Stains the white radiance of Eternity, Until Death tramples it to fragments.-Die, If thou wouldst be with that which thou dost seek! Follow where all is fled!-Rome's azure sky, Flowers, ruins, statues, music-words are weak The glory they transfuse with fitting truth to speak. Why linger, why turn back, why shrink, my heart? Thy hopes are gone before: from all things here They have departed; thou shouldst now depart! A light is passed from the revolving year, And man and woman; and what still is dear Attracts to crush, repels to make thee wither. The soft sky smiles,-the low wind whispers near: "T is Adonais calls! oh, hasten thither,

No more let Life divide what Death can join together.

That Light whose smile kindles the universe,
That beauty in which all things work and move,
That benediction which the eclipsing curse
Of birth can quench not, that sustaining Love
Which through the web of being blindly wove
By man and beast, and earth and air and sea,
Burns bright or dim, as each are mirrors of
The fire for which all thirst, now beams on me,
Consuming the last clouds of cold mortality.

The breath whose might I have invoked in song
Descends on me, my spirit's bark is driven
Far from the shore, far from the trembling throng
Whose sails were never to the tempest given;
The massy earth and spheréd skies are riven:

I am borne darkly, fearfully, afar;

While, burning through the inmost veil of heaven, The soul of Adonais, like a star,

Beacons from the abode where the Eternal are. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.

BEYOND the hills where suns go down,

And brightly beckon as they go,

I see the land of fair renown,

The land which I so soon shall know.

Above the dissonance of time,

And discord of its angry words,

I hear the everlasting chime,

The music of unjarring chords.

I bid it welcome; and my haste To join it cannot brook delay,

O, song of morning, come at last,
And ye who sing it come away.

O, song of light, and dawn, and bliss,
Sound over earth, and fill these skies!
Nor ever, ever, ever cease

Thy soul-entrancing melodies! Glad song of this disburdened earth, Which holy voices then shall sing; Praise for creation's second birth, And glory to creation's King!

HORATIUS BONAR.