Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,
Heaven did a recompense as largely send:
He gave to misery all he had—a tear,

He gained from heaven ('twas all he wished) a friend.

No farther seek his merits to disclose,

Or draw his frailties from their dread abode (There they alike in trembling hope repose), The bosom of his Father and his God.

BEAUTIFUL DREAMS.

She lay unconscious, in dreamy sleep,
While her life-tide was ebbing slowly;
We knew she would pass with the sinking sun,
As we watched by her pillow lowly;
And vainly we waited her farewell word,
One whisper only the silence stirred-

66

'Beautiful dreams! beautiful dreams!”

Again we listened; she slumbered on;
Like a leaf in the light wind shaken,
Her breathing fluttered, her pulse beat low,
We feared she would never waken.
She lifted her large and lustrous eyes,
And uttered again, in glad surprise,

"Such beautiful, beautiful dreams!"

No more-on the wings of those beautiful dreams
She was gone, and the day was ended;

As we folded her hands to their last repose,
The evening shades descended;

And the stars came out and wrote on high,

In golden letters, the mystery

"Beautiful dreams! beautiful dreams!"

Ah! no mere vision of other days,
Of youth's remembered story,

Had lit her fair and fading face

With so rapturous a glory.

Shining across death's pallid night,

From the land that was breaking on her sight,

Came those beautiful, beautiful dreams.

White hands beckoned across the flood;
Sweet lips uttered, "Come over!"
Eyes looked a welcome that never shone
In the gaze of mortal lover.
Lingering, listening, passing away,
She could only smile upon us, and say,

Beautiful dreams! beautiful dreams!"

THE OLD CANOE.-ALBERT PIKE.

Where the rocks are gray and the shore is steep,
And the waters below look dark and deep,
Where the rugged pine, in its lonely pride,
Leans gloomily over the murky tide,

Where the reeds and rushes are long and rank,
And the weeds grow thick on the winding bank,
Where the shadow is heavy the whole day through,
There lies at its moorings the old canoe,

The useless paddles are idly dropped,

Like a sea-bird's wings that the storms had lopped,
And crossed on the railing one o'er one,

Like the folded hands when the work is done;
While busily back and forth between

The spider stretches his silvery screen,

And the solemn owl, with his dull "too-hoo,"
Settles down on the side of the old canoe.

The stern, half sunk in the slimy wave,
Rots slowly away in its living grave,

And the green moss creeps o'er its dull decay,
Hiding its mouldering dust away,

Like the hand that plants o'er the tomb a flower,

Or the ivy that mantles the falling tower;

While many a blossom of loveliest hue
Springs up o'er the stern of the old canoe.

The currentless waters are dead and still,
But the light wind plays with the boat at will,
And lazily in and out again

It floats the length of the rusty chain,
Like the weary march of the hands of time,
That meet and part at the noontide chime;
And the shore is kissed at each turning anew,
By the drippling bow of the old canoe.

Oh, many a time, with a careless hand,

I have pushed it away from the pebbly strand,
And paddled it down where the stream runs quick,
Where the whirls are wild and the eddies are thick,
And laughed as I leaned o'er the rocking side,
And looked below in the broken tide,

To see that the faces and boats were two,
That were mirrored back from the old canoe.

But

now, as I lean o'er the crumbling side, And look below in the sluggish tide,

The face that I see there is graver grown,

And the laugh that I hear has a soberer tone,
And the hands that lent to the light skiff wings
Have grown familiar with sterner things.

But I love to think of the hours that sped

As I rocked where the whirls their white spray shed,
Ere the blossoms waved, or the green grass grew
O'er the mouldering stern of the old canoe.

BILL ARP ON THE RACK.-HE PLEADS ALDERMAN'S DUTIES AT TWO IN THE MORNING.

It's a

E-v-e-r-y night! Here it is half-past one o'clock. wonder you come home at all! What-do-you-think-a woman-is made for? I do believe if a robber was to come

and carry me off, you wouldn't care a▬▬ -What is it you say? City Council business must be attended to! How do I know you go to the city council? Does the city council meet e-v-e-r-y night? Twelve o'clock-one o'clock-two o'clock. Here I stay with the children all alone-lying awake half the night waiting for you. Couldn't come home any sooner! Of course you couldn't if you didn't want to. But I know something; you think I don't, but I do, that I do; I wish I didn't. Where were you last Monday night? Tell me that. The marshal told me the city council didn't meet that night. Now what have you got to say? Couldn't get a quorum! Well, if you couldn't why didn't you come home? Out e-v-e-r-y night-hunting for-a quorum. But you wouldn't hunt for me

this late if I was missing.

Where were you on Thursday

night and Friday night? There was a show in town, wasn't there? What did you buy that bottle of hair oil for, and hide it? Oil for your hone, indeed! Who ever heard of hair oil for a whetstone? So you think I didn't see you in the other room brushing and greasing your hair, and looking in the glass at your pretty self! A man ought to be decent! He ought, ought he? Yes, indeed, a man ought to, and a decent man will stay at home with his wife sometimes, and not be out e-v-e-r-y night. How comes it that the city council didn't meet but twice a month last year? Trying to work out of debt! Yes, that's probable-very; laughing and joking and smoking and swapping lies will work a debt off, won't it? Now-I--want-to-know-how-much-longer-you

-are-going to keep-up-this-night-business. Yes, I want to know. Out e-v-c-r-y night. City council, Free Masons, shows, hair oil-and brush, and brush, and brush until you've nearly worn out the brush and your head too. What is it you say? It helps your business to keep up your social relations! Ah, indeed! You've got relations here at home, sir. They need keeping up some, I should think. What did you say about catching it the other night at a whist party? “Fellows, it's eleven o'clock, but let's play a while longer — we won't catch it any worse when we get home." A pretty speech for a d-e-c-e-n-t man to make! Catch it! Catch it! Well, I intend you shall catch it—a little. What's that you say? If I wouldn't fret you so you would stay at home more! Well, sir, do you stay at home first a few nights and try it; perhaps the fretting would stop. Out e-v-e-r-y night because I fret you so. What's that, sir? You know ladies who ain't always a-scolding their husbands! You do, do you? How come you to know them? What business have you to know them? What right have you to know whether other women fret or not? That's always the way. You men think all other women are saints but your wives; oh, yes, saintss-a-i-n-t-s! I'll have you to know, sir, that there isn't a woman in this town that's more of a saint than I am. I know them all, sir-a h-e-a-p better than you do. You only see the sugar and honey side of them, and they-only-see

the-sugar-side-of-you. Now, sir, I just want you to know that if you can't stay at home more than you do, I'll leave these children here to get burnt up, and I'll go out e-v-e-r-y night. When a poor woman gets desperate, why, sir, she is -SHE IS DESPERATE, that's all.

THE MAGICAL ISLE.

There's a magical isle in the River of Time,
Where softest of echoes are straying;
And the air is as soft as a musical chime,
Or the exquisite breath of a tropical clime
When June with its roses is swaying.

'Tis where Memory dwells with her pure golden hue,
And music forever is flowing:

While the low-murmured tones that come trembling through Sadly trouble the heart, yet sweeten it too,

As the south wind o'er water when blowing.

There are shadowy halls in that fairy-like isle,
Where pictures of beauty are gleaming;

Yet the light of their eyes, and their sweet, sunny smile,
Only flash round the heart with a wildering wile,

And leave us to know 'tis but dreaming.

And the name of this isle is the Beautiful Past,
And we bury our treasures all there:

There are beings of beauty too lovely to last;

There are blossoms of snow, with the dust o'er them cast;
There are tresses and ringlets of hair.

There are fragments of song only memory sings,
And the words of a dear mother's prayer;

There's a harp long unsought, and a lute without strings-
Hallowed tokens that love used to wear.

E'en the dead,- the bright, beautiful dead-there arise,
With their soft, flowing ringlets of gold:

Though their voices are hushed, and o'er their sweet eyes,
The unbroken signet of silence now lies,

They are with us again, as of old.

In the stillness of night, hands are beckoning us there,
And, with joy that is almost a pain,

We delight to turn back, and in wandering there,
Through the shadowy halls of the island so fair,
We behold our lost treasures again.