Let us be patient! These severe afflictions Not from the ground arise, But oftentimes celestial benedictions We see but dimly through the mists and vapors ; What seem to us but sad, funereal tapers There is no Death! What seems so is transition; Is but a suburb of the life elysian, Whose portal we call Death, She is not dead, -the child of our affection,- Where she no longer needs our poor protection, In that great cloister's stillness and seclusion, By guardian angels led, Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution, She lives, whom we call dead. Day after day, we think what she is doing In those bright realms of air; Then up sprang Appius Claudius: "Stop him; alive or dead! Ten thousand pounds of copper To the man who brings his head." He looked upon his clients; But none would work his will. He looked upon his lictors; But they trembled, and stood still. And as Virginius through the press His way in silence cleft, Ever the mighty multitude Fell back to right or left. And he hath passed in safety Unto his woful home, And there ta en horse to tell the camp -Thomas Babington Macaulay. Memory. [The following poem was written by the late President Garfield during his senior year in William's College, Mass., and was pubIshed in William s Quarterly for March, 1856.] And now with noiseless step sweet memory comes The enchanted shadow land where memory dwells? Surcharged with sorrow, cast their sombre shade Upon the sunny, joyous land below. Others are floating though the dreamy air, I see the shadow of my former self, Gliding from childhood up to man's estate; The path of youth winds down through many a vale, -James Abram Garfield. I The Old Familiar Faces. HAVE had playmates, I have had companions, In my days of childhood, in my joyful school-days; All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. I have been laughing, I have been carousing, Drinking late, sitting late, with my bosom cronies; All, all are gone, the old familiar faces. |