THE LANDING OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS IN NEW ENGLAND BY FELICIA HEMANS The breaking waves dashed high And the heavy night hung dark The hills and waters o'er, When a band of exiles moored their bark Not as the conquerer comes, They, the true-hearted, came; Not as the flying come, In silence and in fear; They shook the depths of the desert gloom Amidst the storm they sang, And the stars heard, and the sea; And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang To the anthem of the tree, The ocean eagle soared From his nest by the white wave's foam, And the rocking pines of the forest roared,- There were men with hoary hair Why had they come to wither there, There was woman's fearless eye, Lit by her deep love's truth; There was manhood's brow serenely high, What sought they thus afar? Bright jewels of the mine? The wealth of seas, the spoils of war? Ay, call it holy ground, The soil where first they trod; They have left unstained what there they found,- . THE BOYS BY OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES Has there any old fellow got mixed with the boys? If there has, take him out, without making a noise. Hang the Almanac's cheat and the Catalogue's spite! Old Time is a liar! We're twenty to-night! We're twenty! We're twenty! Who says we are more? He's tipsy, young jackanapes!-show him the door! "Gray temples at twenty?"-Yes! white, if we please; Where the snow-flakes fall thickest there's nothing can freeze! Was it snowing I spoke of? Excuse the mistake! Look close, We've a trick, we young fellows, you may have been told, Of talking (in public) as if we were old: That boy we call Doctor," and this we call "Judge;" It's a neat little fiction, of course it's all fudge. That fellow's the "Speaker," the one on the right; "Mr. Mayor," my young one, how are you to-night? That's our "Member of Congress," we say when we chaff; There's the Reverend make me laugh! What's his name?- don't That boy with the grave mathematical look There's a boy, we pretend, with a three-decker brain, And there's a nice youngster of excellent pith,— You hear that boy laughing? - You think he's all fun; But the angels laugh, too, at the good he has done; Yes, we're boys,- always playing with tongue or with pen; And I sometimes have asked, Shall we ever be men? Shall we always be youthful, and laughing, and gay, Till the last dear companion drops smiling away? Then here's to our boyhood, its gold and its gray! "OLD IRONSIDES " [Written with reference to the proposed breaking up of the famous U. S. frigate "Constitution."] BY OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES Ay, tear her tattered ensign down! And burst the cannon's roar: The meteor of the ocean air Shall sweep the clouds no more! Her deck, once red with heroes' blood, No more shall feel the victor's tread, O better that her shattered hulk And give her to the god of storms, |