WHEN I COME HOME.

And thy pale cheek, with rich tender passion doth bloom,
When I come home, when I come home,

Home, home, when I come home,

Far in the night when I come home.

Clouds furl off the shining face of my life,

When I come home, when I come home;
And leave heaven bare on thy bosom, sweet wife,
When I come home, when I come home.
With her smiling energies-faith, warm and bright—
With love glorified and serenely alight-

With her womanly beauty and queenly calm,

She steals to my heart with her blessing of balm;
And oh, but the wine of Love sparkles with foam,
When I come home, when I come home!

Home, home, when I come home!
Far in the night when I come home.

Gerald Massey.

THE IRISH WIFE.1

I WOULD not give my Irish wife

For all the dames of the Saxon land—

I would not give my Irish wife

For the Queen of France's hand;

1 In 1376 the statute of Kilkenny forbade the English settlers in Ireland to intermarry with the old Irish, under penalty of outlawry. James, Earl of Desmond, and Almaric, Baron Grace, were the first to violate this law. One married an O'Meagher, the other a M'Cormack. Earl Desmond, who was an accomplished poet, may have made a defence like the following for his marriage.-J. D. M.

THE IRISH WIFE.

For she to me is dearer

Than castles strong, or lands, or life,An outlaw-so I'm near her

To love till death, my Irish wife.

Oh, what would be this home of mine?
A ruined, hermit-haunted place,
But for the light that nightly shines
Upon its walls from Kathleen's face;
What comfort in a mine of gold?
What pleasure in a royal life?

If the heart within lay dead and cold-
If I could not wed my Irish wife?

I knew the law forbade the banns-
I knew my king abhorr'd her race:-
Who never bent before their clans

Must bow before their ladies' grace.
Take all my forfeited domain—

I cannot wage with kinsmen, strife; Take knightly gear and noble name, And I will keep my Irish wife.

My Irish wife has clear blue eyes,

My heaven by day, my stars by night; And twin-like truth and fondness lie

Within her swelling bosom white.
My Irish wife has golden hair,-
Apollo's harp had once such strings;

Apollo's self might pause to hear

Her bird-like carol when she sings.

I would not give my Irish wife

For all the dames of the Saxon land

I would not give my Irish wife

For the Queen of France's hand.

THE IRISH WIFE.

For she to me is dearer

Than castles strong, or lands, or life;

In death I would be near her,

And rise beside my Irish wife.

J. D. M'Gee.

LINES ON SEEING MY WIFE AND TWO CHILDREN SLEEPING IN THE SAME CHAMBER.

AND has the earth lost its so spacious round,

The sky its blue circumference above,

That in this little chamber there is found

Both earth and heaven-my universe of Love?

All that my God can give me or remove,
Here sleeping, save myself, in mimic death,
Sweet that in this small compass I behove
To live their living, and to breathe their breath!
Almost I wish that, with one common sigh,
We might resign all mundane care and strife;
And seek together that transcendant sky,
Where Father, Mother, Children, Husband, Wife,
Together pant in everlasting life!

Thomas Hood.

THE JOYS OF HOME.

Life's charities, like light,

Spread smilingly afar;

But stars approach'd, become more bright,

And home is life's own star.

The pilgrim's step in vain

Seeks Eden's sacred ground!
But in home's holy joys, again
An Eden may be found.

A glance of heaven to see,
To none on earth is given;

And yet a happy family

Is but an earlier heaven.

John Bowring.

LADURLAD AND HIS DAUGHTER.

BEHOLD them wandering on their hopeless way,

Unknowing where they stray;

Yet sure where'er they stop to find no rest.

The evening gale is blowing,

It plays among the trees,

Like plumes upon a warrior's crest,

They see yon cocoas tossing to the breeze;

Ladurlad views them with impatient mind,

Impatiently he hears

The gale of evening blowing,

The sound of waters flowing,

As if all sights and sounds combined