inside, as usual burst the door open, and roll obesely out into the road. A blessed Bottle with a charmed existence, he took no hurt, and we repaired damage, and went on triumphant. A thousand representations were made to me that the Bottle must be left at this place, or that, and called for again. I never yielded to one of them, and never parted from the Bottle, on any pretence, consideration, threat, or entreaty. I had no faith in any official receipt for the Bottle, and nothing would induce me to accept one. These unmanageable politics at last brought me and the Bottle, still triumphant, to Genoa. There I took a tender and reluctant leave of him for a few weeks, and consigned him to a trusty English captain, to be conveyed to the port of London by sea. While the Bottle was on his voyage to England, I read the Shipping Intelligence, as anxiously as if I had been an underwriter. There was some stormy weather after I myself had got to England by way of Switzerland and France, and my mind greatly misgave me that the Bottle might be wrecked. At last, to my great joy, I received notice of his safe arrival, and immediately went down to Saint Katharine's Docks, and found him in a state of honorable captivity in the custom-house. The wine was mere vinegar when I set it down before the generous Englishman, probably it had been something like vinegar when I took it up from Giovanni Carlavero, but not a drop of it was spilled or gone. And the Englishman told me, with much emotion in his face and voice, that he had never tasted wine that seemed to him so sweet and sound. And long afterward, the Bottle graced his table. And the last time I saw him in this world that misses him, he took me aside in a crowd, to say, with his amiable smile : "We were talking of you only to-day at dinner, and I wished you had been there, for I had some claret up in Carlavero's Bottle." 1 WHEN I AWAKE, I AM STILL WITH THEE. BY MRS. H. B. STOWE. S (TILL, still with thee, when purple morning breaketh. Fairer than morning, lovelier than the daylight, Alone with thee, amid the mystic shadows, In the calm dew and freshness of the morn. As in the dawning o'er the waveless ocean Thine image in the waters of my breast. Still, still with thee! as to each new-born morning Breathe, each day, nearness unto thee and heaven. When sinks the soul, subdued by toil, to slumber, So shall it be at last, in that bright morning Shall rise the glorious thought, I am with thee' THE EVE OF ST. AGNES. BY JOHN KEATS. T. AGNES' EVE, ST: ah, bitter chill it was! The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold; The hare limped trembling through the frozen grass, Numb were the beadsman's fingers while he told Like pious incense from a censer old, Seemed taking flight for heaven without a death, His prayer he saith, this patient, holy man ; Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees; The sculptured dead on each side seem to freeze, He passeth by; and his weak spirit fails To think how they may ache in icy hoods and mails. Northward he turneth through a little door, But no, -- already had his death-bell rung; sung: The joys of all his life were said and Rough ashes sat he for his soul's reprieve, And all night kept awake, for sinners' sake to grieve. That ancient beadsman heard the prelude soft: Were glowing to receive a thousand guests: Stared, where upon their heads the cornice rests, With hair blown back, and wings put crosswise on their breasts. At length burst in the argent revelry, The brain, new-stuffed, in youth, with triumphs gay They told her how, upon St. Agnes' Eve, Full of this whim was thoughtful Madeline; Pass by, Came many a tiptoe, amorous cavalier, And back retired, not cooled by high disdain. But she saw not; her heart was otherwhere; She sighed for Agnes' dreams, the sweetest of the year. She danced along with vague, regardless eyes, So, purposing each moment to retire, She lingered still. Meantime, across the moors, Buttressed from moonlight, stands he, and implores All saints to give him sight of Madeline; But for one moment in the tedious hours, That he might gaze and worship all unseen; Perchance speak, kneel, touch, kiss, — in sooth such things have been. He ventures in: let no buzzed whisper tell: |