OLD.

Y the wayside, on a mossy When the stranger seemed to mark our play,
Some of us were joyous, some sad-hearted;

stone,

Sat a hoary pilgrim sadly I remember well, too well, that day:

musing;

Oft I marked him sitting

there alone,

All the landscape like a

page perusing-
Poor, unknown,

By the wayside, on a mossy

stone.

Oftentimes the tears unbidden started-
Would not stay-

When the stranger seemed to mark our play.

One sweet spirit broke the silent spell;

Oh, to me her name was always Heaven!
She besought him all his grief to tell
(I was then thirteen and she eleven),
Isabel.

Buckled knee and shoe and broad-brimmed One sweet spirit broke the silent spell.
hat,

Coat as ancient as the form 'twas folding, Silver buttons, queue and crimped cravat, Oaken staff his feeble hand upholding, There he sat

Buckled knee and shoe and broad-brimmed hat.

Seemed it pitiful he should sit there,

No one sympathizing, no one heeding, None to love him for his thin gray hair, And the furrows all so mutely pleading Age and care

Seemed it pitiful he should sit there.

It was summer, and we went to school,
Dapper country lads and little maidens;
Taught the motto of the "dunce's stool;"
Its grave import still my fancy ladens:

"Here's a fool!"

It was summer, and we went to school.

"Angel," said he, sadly, "I am old;

Earthly hope no longer hath a morrow;
Yet why I sit here thou shalt be told."

Then his eye betrayed a pearl of sorrow:
Down it rolled.

"Angel," said he, sadly, "I am old.

"Old stone school-house! it is still the same;
There's the very step I so oft mounted ;
There's the window creaking in its frame,
And the notches that I cut and counted
For the
game.
Old stone school-house! it is still the same.

"In the cottage yonder I was born:

Long my happy home that humble dwelling;

There the fields of clover, wheat and corn; There the spring with limpid nectar swelling.

Ah, forlorn!

In the cottage yonder I was born.

"Those two gateway sycamores you see
Then were planted just so far asunder
That long well-pole from the path to free,
And the wagon to pass safely under.
Ninety-three!

Those two gateway sycamores you see.

"There's the orchard where we used to climb When my mates and I were boys together, Thinking nothing of the flight of time,

Fearing naught but work and rainy weather.

Past its prime,

There's the mill that ground our yellow
grain,

Pond and river still serenely flowing;
Cot there nestling in the shaded lane,
Where the lily of my heart was blowing-
Mary Jane!

There's the mill that ground our yellow grain.

"There's the gate on which I used to swing, Brook and bridge and barn and old red

stable;

But, alas! no more the morn shall bring

That dear group around my father's table.
Taken wing!

There's the gate on which I used to swing.

"I am fleeing-all I loved have fled:

Yon green meadow was our place for play

ing;

That old tree can tell of sweet things said
When around it Jane and I were straying.
She is dead!

I am fleeing all I loved have fled.

"Yon white spire, a pencil on the sky,
Tracing silently life's changeful story,
So familiar to my
dim old eye,
Points me to seven that are now in glory
There on high-

There's the orchard where we used to climb. Yon white spire, a pencil on the sky.

"There the rude three-cornered chestnut- "Oft the aisle of that old church we trod, rails Guided thither by an angel-mother; Round the pasture where the flocks were Now she sleeps beneath its sacred sod— grazing, Sire and sisters, and my little brother, Gone to God!

Where so sly I used to watch for quails

In the crops of buckwheat we were rais- Oft the aisle of that old church we trod.

ing.

Traps and trails!

There the rude three-cornered chestnut-rails.

"There I heard of Wisdom's pleasant ways

Bless the holy lesson!--but, ah never

THE FEAST OF BELSHAZZAR.

Belshazzar's impious feast; a handwriting unknown to the magicians troubleth the king. At the commendation of the queen, Daniel is brought. He, reproving the king of pride and idolatry, readeth

OT by one portal or one path | Spiritless captives sinking with the chain.

alone

God's holy messages to men

are known:

awful eyes,

Have read this page and taken heart again.

From sunlight unto starlight trumpets told

Waiting the glances of his Her king's command in Babylon the old;
From sunlight unto starlight, west and east,
Silver-winged seraphs do him A thousand satraps girt them for the feast,
And reined their chargers to the palace-hall

embassies,

high behest,
Guide the lone feet and glad
the failing breast;

And stars, interpreting his Where King Belshazzar held high festival-
A pleasant palace under pleasant skies,
With cloistered courts and gilded galleries,
And gay kiosk and painted balustrade
For winter terraces and summer shade;
By court and terrace, minaret and dome,
Euphrates, rushing from his mountain-home,
Rested his rage and curbed his crested pride
To belt that palace with his bluest tide;
Broad-fronted bulls with chiselled feathers
barred,

The rolling thunder and the raging sea
Speak the stern purpose of the Deity,
And storms beneath and rainbow-hues above
Herald his anger or proclaim his love;

The still small voices of the summer day,
The red sirocco and the breath of May,
The lingering harmony in ocean-shells,
The fairy music of the meadow-bells,

Earth and void air, water and wasting
flame,

In silent vigil keeping watch and ward,
Giants of granite wrought by cunning hand,
Guard in the gate and frown upon the land.

Have words to whisper, tongues to tell, his Not summer's glow nor yellow autumn's

Listen and learn! Tyrants have heard the And fell with lessened lustre, broken light tale, Tracing quaint arabesque of dark and white,

And turned from hearing terror-struck and Or dimly tinting on the graven stones

pale;

The pictured annals of Chaldæan thrones.