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How they shouted! what rejoicing!

How the old bell shook the air,
Till the clang of freedom ruffled
The calmly gliding Delaware.
How the bonfires and the torches
Lighted up the night's repose,
And from flames, like fabled Phoenix,
Our glorious liberty arose.

at old State House bell is silent,
Hushed is now its clamorous tongue;
But the spirit it awakened

Still is living-ever young;

And when we greet the smiling sunlight,
On the fourth of each July,

We will ne'er forget the bellman,
Who, betwixt the earth and sky,
Rang out loudly "INDEPENDENCE,"
Which, please God, shall never die.

Mary Maloney's Philosophy.

"What are you singing for?" said I to Mary Maloney.

"Oh, I don't know, ma'am, without it's because my heart feels

happy."

66

Happy, are you, Mary Maloney? Let me see; you a foot of land in the world?"

don't own

"Foot of land, is it?". she cried, with a hearty Irish laugh; "oh, what a hand ye be after joking; why, I haven't a penny, let alone the land."

"Your mother is dead!"

"God rest her soul, yes,” replied Mary Maloney, with a touch of genuine pathos; may the angels make her bed in heaven."

"Your brother is still a hard case, I suppose."

"Ah, you may well say that. It's nothing but drink, drink. drink, and beating his poor wife, that she is, the creature"

"You have to pay your little sister's board."

"Sure, the bit creature, and she's a good little girl, is Hinny, willing to do whatever I axes her. I don't grudge the money what goes for that."

"You haven't many fashionable dresses either, Mary Maloney."

"Fashionable, is it? Oh, yes, I put a piece of whalebone in my skirt, and me calico gown looks as big as the great ladies'. But then ye says true, I hasn't but two gowns to me back, two shoes to me feet, and one bonnet to me head, barring the old hood ye gave me."

"You haven't any lover, Mary Maloney."

"Oh, be off wid ye-ketch Mary Maloney getting a lover these days, when the hard times is come. No, no, thank Heaven I haven't got that to trouble me yet, nor I don't want it."

"What on earth, then, have you got to make you happy? A drunken brother, a poor helpless sister, no mother, no father, no lover; why, where do you get all your happiness from ?"

"The Lord be praised, Miss, it growed up in me. Give me a bit of sunshine, a clean flure, plenty of work, and a sup at the right time, and I'm made. That makes me laugh and sing, and then if deep trouble comes, why, God helpin' me, I'll try to keep my heart up. Sure, it would be a sad thing if Patrick McGrue should take it into his head to come an ax me, but, the Lord willin', I'd try to bear up under it."

Philadelphia Bulletin,

The Ballad of Babie Bell
L

Have you not heard the poets tell
How came the dainty Babie Bell

Into this world of ours?

The gates of heaven were left ajar:
With folded hands and dreamy eyes,

Wandering out of Paradise,

She saw this planet, like a star,

Hung in the glittering depths of even,

Its bridges, running to and fro,

O'er which the white-winged angels go,
Bearing the holy dead to heaven!

She touched a bridge of flowers, those feet,
So light they did not bend the bells

Of the celestial asphodels!

They fell like dew upon the flowers,

Then all the air grew strangely sweet;

And thus came dainty Babie Bell

Into this world of ours.

II

She came and brought delicious May, The swallows built beneath the eaves;

Like sunlight in and out the leaves, The robins went, the livelong day; The lily swung its noiseless bell,

And o'er the porch the trembling vine
Seemed bursting with its veins of wine;

How sweetly, softly, twilight fell!
Oh, earth was full of singing birds,

And opening spring-tide flowers,

When the dainty Babie Bell

Came to this world of ours!

III.

O Babie, dainty Babie Bell,
How fair she grew from day to day!
What woman-nature filled her eyes,
What poetry within them lay!
Those deep and tender twilight eyes,
So full of meaning, pure and bright,
As if she yet stood in the light
Of those opened gates of paradise!
And so we loved her more and more;
Ah, never in our hearts before

Was love so lovely born;

We felt we had a link between
This real world and that unseen,

The land beyond the morn"

And for the love of those dear eyes

For love of her whom God led forth (The mother's being ceased on earth When Babie came from Paradise)— For love of him who smote our lives,

And woke the chords of joy and pain, We said, "Dear Christ!" our hearts bent down Like violets after rain.

IV.

And now the orchards, which were white
And red with blossoms when she came,
Were rich in autumn's mellow prime,

The clustered apples burnt like flame,
The soft-cheeked peaches blushed and fell,
The ivory chestnut burst its shell,

The grape hung purpling in the grange,
And time wrought just as rich a change
In little Babie Bell.

Her lissome form more perfect grew,

And in her features we could trace,
In softened curves, her mother's face,
Her angel-nature ripened too,
We thought her lovely when she came,
But she was holy, saintly now,
Around her pale angelic brow
We saw a slender ring of flame!

V.

God's hand had taken away the seal
That held the portals of her speech;
And oft she said a few strange words,
Whose meaning lay beyond our reach.
She never was a child to us,

We never held her being's key;
We could not teach her holy things,
She was Christ's self in purity.

ᏙᏞ

It came upon us by degrees,

We saw its shadow 'ere it fell,
The knowledge that our God had sent
His messenger for Babie Bell.

We shuddered with unlanguaged pain,
And all our thoughts ran into tears,
Like sunshine into rain.

We cried aloud in our belief,
"Oh, smite us gently, gently, God!
Teach us to bend and kiss the rod,

And perfect grow through grief,"
Ah, how we loved her, God can tell;
Her heart was folded deep in ours;
Our hearts are broken Babie Bell.

VII.

At last he came, the messenger,

The messenger from unseen lands,
And what did dainty Babie Bell?
She only crossed her hands,
She only looked more meek and fair!
We parted back her silken hair;
We wove the roses round her brow,
White buds, the summer's drifted snow,

Wrapped her from head to foot in flowers,
And thus went dainty Babie Bell

Out of this world of ours!

Thomas Bailey Aldrich

The Irishwoman's Letter.

And sure, I was tould to come in till yer honer,
To see would ye write a few lines to me Pat,
He's gone for a soger is Misther O'Conner,

Wid a sthripe on his arm, and a band on his hat.

And what 'ill ye tell him? shure it must be aisy

For the likes of yer honor to spake with the pen,

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