INTRODUCTORY STANZAS.

To bud, to blossom, and to fade;
May seem of flowers the tale ;-
Why seek to twine a deathless braid
Of things so slight, and frail?

Because unto the simplest flower
Is given a magic art,

To point-in meditation's hour,
Some moral to the heart.

Surely that moral best may plead

Its tenderness and truth,

With those who such fair tablets read
While yet in opening youth.

Did not our blessed Lord-who taught
As man can never teach,

Unfold to feeling, and to thought,

The truths which these can preach?

B

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INTRODUCTORY STANZAS.

Behold the lilies of the field,

They neither spin, nor toil;

And yet the pomp by kings reveal'd—
To them is but a foil.

Can blame, then, unto those belong
Who thus, in leisure hours,

Have sought to cull from realms of song
A wreath of stainless flowers.

Not glean'd to glad the sense, alone,

Or captivate the eye,

And then, like weeds, aside be thrown,
To wither, and to die.

But one whose virtue should out-last

The beauty it displays;

And be, like bread on waters cast,
Found in far distant days.

B. BARTON.

CULLED FLOWERS.

THE WANDERER

AND THE NIGHT

BLOWING FLOWERS.

Call back your odours, lovely flowers,
From the night winds call them back,
And fold your leaves till the laughing hours
Come forth in the sunbeam's track.

The lark lies couched in her grassy nest,
And the honey bee is gone,

And all bright things are away to rest,
Why watch ye here alone?

Is not your world a mournful one,

When sisters close their eyes,

And

your

your soft breath meets not a lingering tone Of song in the starry skies?

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THE WANDERER, ETC.

Take ye no joy in the day-spring's birth,

When it kindles the sparks of dew?

And the thousand strains of the forest's mirth,
Shall they gladden all but you?

Shut your sweet bells till the fawn comes out
On the sunny turf to play,

And the woodland child with a fairy shout
Goes dancing on its way!

"Nay, let our shadowy beauty bloom
When the stars give quiet light,
And let us offer our faint perfume
On the silent shrine of night.

"Call it not wasted, the scent we lend

To the breeze, when no step is nigh;
Oh, thus for ever the earth should send
Her grateful breath on high!

"And love us as emblems, night's dewy flowers,

Of hopes unto sorrow given,

That spring through the gloom of the darkest hours,
Looking alone to heaven!"

F. HEMANS.

"HOW OLD ART THOU?"

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"HOW OLD ART THOU ?"

Count not the days that have idly flown,
The years that were vainly spent,

Nor speak of the hours thou must blush to own
When thy spirit stands before the throne,
To account for the talents lent.

But number the hours redeem'd from sin,
The moments employ'd for heaven ;—
Oh, few and evil thy days have been,
Thy life a toilsome but worthless scene,
For a nobler purpose given.

Will the shade go back on thỳ dial plate?
Will thy sun stand still on his way?

Both hasten on; and thy spirit's fate
Rests on the point of life's little date:—
Then "live while 'tis called to day."

Life's waning hours, like the Sybil's page,
As they lessen, in value rise;

Oh, rouse thee and live! nor deem that man's age
Stands in the length of his pilgrimage,

But in days that are truly wise.

L. H. C.