A MUSICAL BOX.

Not a bonnet in church but she knows it well,
And Fashion she worships with down-cast eyes;
A marchande de modes is her oracle,

And Paris her earthly paradise.

She's perfect to whirl with in a waltz;

And her shoulders show well on a soft divan, As she lounges at night and spreads her silks, And plays with her bracelets and flirts her fan, With a little laugh at whatever you say,

And rounding her "No" with a look of surprise, And lisping her "Yes" with an air distrait, And a pair of aimless, wandering eyes.

Her duty this Christian never omits!

She makes her calls, and she leaves her cards, And enchants a circle of half-fledged wits,

And slim attachés and six-foot Guards.

Her talk is of people, who're nasty or nice,
And she likes little bon-bon compliments;

While she seasons their sweetness by way of spice,
By some witless scandal she often invents.

Is this the thing for a mother or wife?
Could love ever grow on such barren rocks?
Is this a companion to take for a wife?
One might as well marry a musical box.

You exhaust in a day her full extent,

'Tis the same little tinkle of tunes always, You must wind her up with a compliment. To be bored with the only airs she plays.

W. W. STORY.

THE WIDOW AND CHILD.

HOME they brought her warrior dead;
She nor swooned, nor uttered cry.
All her maidens, watching, said

"She must weep, or she will die!

Then they praised him, soft and low;
Called him worthy to be loved:
Truest friend and noblest foe!

Yet she neither spake nor moved.

Stole a maiden from her place,
Lightly to the warrior stept,
Took a face-cloth from the face;
Yet she neither moved nor wept.

Rose a nurse of ninety years,
Set his child upon her knee.

Like summer tempest came her tears:
"Sweet my child, I live for thee!"

ALFRED TENNYSON.

THE gray sea, and the long black land; And the yellow half-moon, large and low;

SHE WAS A PHANTOM OF DELIGHT.

And the startled little waves, that leap
In fiery ringlets from their sleep,
As I gain the cove with pushing prow,
And quench its speed in the slushy sand.

Then a mile of warm, sea-scented beach;
Three fields to cross, till a farm appears;
A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch
And blue spirt of a lighted match;

And a voice less loud, through its joys and fears,
Than the two hearts, beating each to each!

Round the cape, of a sudden, came the sea,
And the sun looked over the mountain's rim
And straight was a path of gold for him,
And the need of a world of men for me!

-

ROBERT BROWNING

SHE WAS A PHANTOM OF DELIGHT.

SHE was a phantom of delight
When first she gleamed upon my sight,
A lovely apparition, sent

To be a moment's ornament: