Mourn not for the owl nor his gloomy plight! Thrice fonder, perhaps, since a strange dark fate So when the night falls, and dogs do howl, But the king of the night is the bold brown owl. Barry Cornwall. LESSON XC.-THE BURIAL OF MOSES. "And he buried him in a valley in the land of Moab, over against Bethpeor; but no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day." -DEUT. xxxiv. 6. By Nebo's lonely mountain, On this side Jordan's wave, And no man saw it e'er, For the angels of God upturned the sod, And laid the dead man there. That was the grandest funeral Noiselessly as the daylight Comes when the night is done, And the crimson streak on ocean's cheek Noiselessly as the spring-time Or voice of them that wept, Silently down from the mountain's crown On grey Bethpeor's height, Looked on the wondrous sight. Perchance the lion stalking Still shuns that sacred spot; For beast and bird have seen and heard That which man knoweth not. But when the warrior dieth, His comrades in the war, With arms reversed and muffled drum, Follow the funeral car. They show the banners taken, They tell his battles won, And after him lead his masterless steed, While peals the minute gun. Amid the noblest of the land Men lay the sage to rest, With costly marble drest, In the great Minster transept, Where lights like glories fall, And the sweet choir sings, and the organ rings Along the emblazoned wall. This was the bravest warrior That ever buckled sword; This the most gifted poet That ever breathed a word; And never earth's philosopher Traced with his golden pen, On the deathless page truths half so sage, And had he not high honour? With stars for tapers tall; And the dark rock pines, like tossing plumes, Over his bier to wave, And God's own hand, in that lonely land, In that deep grave without a name, Shall break again, most wondrous thought! Before the judgment day; And stand, with glory wrapped around, On the hills he never trod, And speak of the strife that won our life O lonely tomb in Moab's land! Ways that we cannot tell; He hides them deep, like the secret sleep Of him He loved so well.-Dublin Univ. Mag. LESSON XCI.-HOME THOUGHTS FROM ABROAD. Oh, to be in England Now that April's there, And whoever wakes in England Sees, some morning, unaware, That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf And after April, when May follows, And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows- Blossoms and dewdrops-at the bent spray's edge- The first fine careless rapture! And though the fields look rough with hoary dew, R. Browning. LESSON XCII.-THE LOST EXPEDITION. Lift-lift, ye mists, from off the silent coast, In vain the North has hid them from our sight: The snow their winding-sheet-their only dirges The groan of icebergs in the polar night, Racked by the savage surges. No funeral torches, with a smoky glare, Shone a farewell upon their shrouded faces ; No monumental pillar, tall and fair, Towers o'er their resting places. But northern streamers flare the long night through Of amethyst and beryl. No human tears upon their graves are shed- Yet history shrines them with her mighty dead, LESSON XCIII.-THE RAINBOW. A fragment of a rainbow bright An hour ago the storm was here, Grief will be joy, if on its edge Joy will be grief, if no faint pledge Be there of heavenly day. -Keble. Hood. |