My heart is awed within me when I think

Of the great miracle that still goes on, 70 In silence, round me—the perpetual work Of thy creation, finished, yet renewed Forever. Written on thy works I read The lesson of thy own eternity.

Lo! all grow old and die-but see again, How on the faltering footsteps of decay Youth presses-ever gay and beautiful youth

In all its beautiful forms. These lofty trees

Wave not less proudly that their ancestors Moulder beneath them. Oh, there is not lost 80

One of earth's charms: upon her bosom yet,

After the flight of untold centuries,
The freshness of her far beginning lies
And yet shall lie. Life mocks the idle
hate

Of his arch-enemy Death-yea, seats himself

Upon the tyrant's throne-the sepulchre, And of the triumphs of his ghastly foe Makes his own nourishment. For he came forth

From thine own bosom, and shall have no end.

I fill this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,-

A woman, of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon;
To whom the better elements

And kindly stars have given
A form so fair, that, like the air,
'Tis less of earth than heaven.
Her every tone is music's own,
Like those of morning birds;
And something more than melody
Dwells ever in her words;
The coinage of her heart are they,
And from her lips each flows
As one may see the burdened bee
Forth issue from the rose.

Affections are as thoughts to her,
The measures of her hours;
Her feelings have the fragrancy,
The freshness of young flowers;
And lovely passions, changing oft,
So fill her, she appears

The image of themselves by turns,-
The idol of past years!

ΙΟ

20

OLD IRONSIDES

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES

[When he was a law student at Cambridge, Holmes's indignation was aroused by a newspaper paragraph announcing that it was posed to destroy the historic U. S. frigate Constitution, now old and valueless. He dashed off these verses, and the interest which they aroused prolonged the life of the warship.]

Ay, tear her tattered ensign down!
Long has it waved on high,
And many an eve has danced to see
That banner in the sky;
Beneath it rung the battle shout,
And burst the cannon's roar;-
The meteor of the ocean air

Shall sweep the clouds no more.

In the snow.

But now his nose is thin,

And it rests upon his chin

Like a staff,

And a crook is in his back, And a melancholy crack In his laugh.

I know it is a sin

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