To him that hath not eyes in vain, Our village-microcosm can show.

Come back our ancient walks to tread,

Dear haunts of lost or scattered friends, Old Harvard's scholar-factories red, Where song and smoke and laughter sped The nights to proctor-haunted ends. Constant are all our former loves,

Unchanged the icehouse-girdled pond, Its hemlock glooms, its shadowy coves, Where floats the coot and never moves, Its slope of long-tamed green beyond.

Our old familiars are not laid,

As upon Adam, red like blood, "Tween him and Eden's happy wood, Glared the commissioned angel's shield.

Or let us seek the seaside, there
To wander idly as we list,
Whether, on rocky headlands bare,
Sharp cedar-horns, like breakers, tear
The trailing fringes of gray mist,

Or whether, under skies full flown,

The brightening surfs, with foamy din, Their breeze-caught forelocks backward blown, Against the beach's yellow zone,

Curl slow, and plunge forever in.

Where, as the cloudbergs eastward blow,

From glow to gloom the hillsides shift Their plumps of orchard trees arow, Their lakes of rye that wave and flow, Their snowy whiteweed's summer drift.

There have we watched the West unfurl
A cloud Byzantium newly born,
With flickering spires and domes of pearl,
And vapory surfs that crowd and curl
Into the sunset's Golden Horn.

There, as the flaming occident

Burned slowly down to ashes gray, Night pitched o'erhead her silent tent, And glimmering gold from Hesper sprent Upon the darkened river lay,

Where a twin sky but just before

Deepened, and double swallows skimmed, And, from a visionary shore, Hung visioned trees, that, more and more, Grew dusk as those above were dimmed.

Then eastward saw we slowly grow
Clear-edged the lines of roof and spire,
While great elm-masses blacken slow,
And linden-ricks their round heads show
Against a flush of widening fire.

Doubtful at first and far away,

The moon-flood creeps more wide and wide; Up a ridged beach of cloudy gray, Curved round the east as round a bay, It slips and spreads its gradual tide.

Then suddenly, in lurid mood,

The moon looms large o'er town and field,

That lean along the horizon's rim, "Sail on," I'll say ; 'may sunniest hours Convoy you from this land of ours,

Since from my side you bear not him!' !"

DREAMS AND REALITIES.

O ROSAMOND, thou fair and good
And perfect flower of womanhood!

Thou royal rose of June!

Why didst thou droop before thy time? Why wither in the first sweet prime? Why didst thou die so soon?

For, looking backward through my tears On thee, and on my wasted years,

I cannot choose but say,

If thou hadst lived to be my guide, Or thou hadst lived and I had died, 'T were better far to-day.

O child of light, O golden head!
Bright sunbeam for one moment shed
Upon life's lonely way,

Why didst thou vanish from our sight?
Could they not spare my little light
From heaven's unclouded day?

O friend so true, O friend so good!·
Thou one dream of my maidenhood,
That gave youth all its charms,
What had I done, or what hadst thou,
That, through this lonesome world till now,
We walk with empty arms?

And yet this poor soul had been fed
With all it loved and coveted;

Had life been always fair,

Would these dear dreams that ne'er depart, That thrill with bliss my inmost heart, Forever tremble there?

If still they kept their earthly place,
The friends I held in my embrace,

And gave to death, alas!

Could I have learned that clear, calm faith
That looks beyond the bonds of death,
And almost longs to pass?

Sometimes, I think, the things we see Are shadows of the things to be;

That what we plan we build ; That every hope that hath been crossed, And every dream we thought was lost, In heaven shall be fulfilled;

That even the children of the brain
Have not been born and died in vain,
Though here unclothed and dumb;
But on some brighter, better shore
They live, embodied evermore,
And wait for us to come.

And when on that last day we rise,
Caught up between the earth and skies,
Then shall we hear our Lord

Say, Thou hast done with doubt and death,
Henceforth, according to thy faith,
Shall be thy faith's reward.

PHOEBE CARY.

THE OLD SCHOOL-HOUSE.

I SAT an hour to-day, John,

Beside the old brook-stream,

Where we were school-boys in old time, When manhood was a dream;

The brook is choked with fallen leaves,
The pond is dried away,

I scarce believe that you would know
The dear old place to-day.

The school-house is no more, John,
Beneath our locust-trees,

The wild rose by the window's side
No more waves in the breeze;
The scattered stones look desolate;
The sod they rested on

Has been plowed up by stranger hands,
Since you and I were gone.