And again we two are together,
All alone in the night.

They tell me his mind is failing,
But I smile at idle fears;

He is only back with the children,
In the dear and peaceful years.

And still, as the summer sunset
Fades away in the west,

And the wee ones, tired of playing,
Go trooping home to rest,

My husband calls from his corner,

Say, love, have the children come?"

And I answer, with eyes uplifted,

"Yes, dear, they are all at home."

IRENE

BY MARGARET E. SANGSTER

[Written on the death of a young friend.]

In sweetest blush of maiden bloom,
A flower so rare in tint and line,
The Gardener lifts thee to illume
Some chosen place in realms divine.

And deep must be the shadow here,
Where thy fair presence ever made
(So gentle wert thou, and so dear)
A sunshine in the darkest shade.

No memory of thy life is sad,

We think of thee, with pure delight,

As alway making others glad,
And ever speaking for the right.

Like music set to tender words,
Thy duties moved through quiet days,
And still thy voice, like morning birds,
Was only heard in tones of praise.

While yet the dew was on the leaf,
Thy heart was given to Christ the King;
We dreamed not then that all too brief
Would seem thy life, who saw thee bring

Sweet gifts, the gold of sacrifice,
The myrrh of never doubting love,
And all thou hadst of worth or price
To offer to the Lord above.

Our fair Irene! Our child of peace,
Our hearts are rent with grief and pain,
But thou of pain hast now surcease,
Thou shalt not taste its draught again.

Thy bitterness is over now,

The Cross no more on thee shall press,
No fear shall ever veil thy brow,

Or sorrow give thy soul distress.

Thou art with Him who loved thee more
Than earthly friends, than nearest kin;
We wait like watchers on the shore,
But thou, to port, hath entered in.

And there, beyond the storm and strife,
Beyond these tides with ebb and flow,
Serene, in heaven's immortal life,
Thy place is safe till we shall go.

As one by one, we all must cross
The stream so deep and dark and cold,
Which leads us, far from mortal loss,
To dwell within the gates of gold.

O! mourning ones! through tears and dread
Of lonely days, this comfort glean,
Your darling sleeps. She is not dead,
With Christ she lives! your blessed Irene.

OUR OWN

BY MARGARET E. SANGSTER

If I had known, in the morning,
How wearily all the day

The words unkind would trouble my mind
That I said when you went away,

I had been more careful, darling,

Nor given you needless pain;

But

we vex our own with look and tone We might never take back again.

For though in the quiet evening

You may give me the kiss of peace, Yet it well might be that never for me The pain of the heart should cease;

How many go forth at morning

Who never come home at night,

And hearts have broken for harsh words spoken That sorrow can ne'er set right.

We have careful thought for the stranger,
And smiles for the sometime guest,
But oft for our own the bitter tone,
Though we love our own the best.
Ah, lip with the curve impatient,

Ah, brow with the shade of scorn,
"T were a cruel fate were the night too late
To undo the work of morn.

A LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE

BY EPES SARGENT

A life on the ocean wave,

A home on the rolling deep;
Where the scatter'd waters rave,
And the winds their revels keep!
Like an eagle caged I pine

On this dull, unchanging shore:
Oh, give me the flashing brine,

The spray and the tempest's roar!

Once more on the deck I stand,

Of my own swift-gliding craft:
Set sail! farewell to the land;
The gale follows fair abaft.

We shoot through the sparkling foam,
Like an ocean-bird set free,

Like the ocean-bird, our home

We'll find far out on the sea.

The land is no longer in view,
The clouds have begun to frown;
But with a stout vessel and crew,
'We'll say, Let the storm come down!
And the song of our hearts shall be,
While the winds and the waters rave,

A home on the rolling sea!

A life on the ocean wave!

TREASURE IN HEAVEN

BY JOHN GODFREY SAXE

RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED TO GEORGE PEABODY, ESQ.

66

'What I spent, I had; what I left,

I lost; what I gave, I have!"

OLD EPITAPH

Every coin of earthly treasure
We have lavished, upon earth,
For our simple worldly pleasure,
May be reckoned something worth;

For the spending was not losing,
Though the purchase were but small;
It has perished with the using: