dine abroad in this season (December), you may at least let a friend or two dine with you." 66 Well, well, come you and dine with me to-morrow," looking earnestly at Miss Hunter, his niece. "I am engaged to-morrow, but I can return at four to-day." He looked more earnestly at his niece. "What's to hinder him?" said she, meaning to answer his look, which said, "Have you any dinner to-day, Betty?" I returned, accordingly, at four, and never passed four hours more agreeably with him, nor had more enlightened conversation. Nay more, three days before his death he sent to John Home a part of his History, with two or three pages of criticism on that part of it that relates to Provost Drummond, in which he and I thought John egregiously wrong.

It was long before Blair's circumstances were full, yet he lived handsomely, and had literary strangers at his house, as well as many friends. A task imposed on both Robertson and Blair was reading manuscript prepared for the press, of which Blair had the greatest share of the poetry, and Robertson of the other writings, and they were both kind encouragers of young men of merit.

1

BEATRICE'S SONG.

BY PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.

OME, I will sing you some low, sleepy tune,

COME

Not cheerful, nor yet sad; some dull old thing

Some outworn and unused monotony,

Such as our country gossips sing and spin,
Till they almost forget they live: lie down!
So; that will do. Have I forgot the words?
Faith! they are sadder than I thought they were

SONG.

False friend, wilt thou smile or weep

When my life is laid asleep?

Little cares for a smile or a tear

The clay-cold corpse upon the bier;
Farewell! Heigh-ho!

What is this whispers low?

There is a snake in thy smile, my dear
And bitter poison within thy tear.

Sweet sleep! were death like to thee,

Or if thou couldst mortal be,
I would close these eyes of pain;
When to wake? Never again.
O World! farewell!

Listen to the passing bell!

It says, thou and I must part,
With a light and a heavy heart.

THANATOPSIS.

BY WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT.

O him who, in the love of Nature, holds

Communion with her visible forms, she speaks

A various language: for his gayer hours

She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty; and she glides
Into his darker musings with a mild
And gentle sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware.
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images

When thoughts

Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,

And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart,
Go forth under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air
Comes a still voice, - Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist

Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim

Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again;

And, lost each human trace, surrendering up

Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix forever with the elements;

To be a brother to the insensible rock,

And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.
Yet not to thine eternal resting-place

Shalt thou retire alone,

nor couldst thou wish

Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world, with kings,
The powerful of the earth, the wise, the good,

Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,
All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills,
Rock-ribbed, and ancient as the sun; the vales
Stretching in pensive quietness between;
The venerable woods; rivers that move
In majesty, and the complaining brooks,

That make the meadows green; and, poured round all, Old ocean's gray and melancholy waste,

Are but the solemn decorations all

Of the great tomb of man! The golden sun,
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,
Are shining on the sad abodes of death,
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings
Of morning, traverse Barca's desert sands,

Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound
Save his own dashings, yet the dead are there!
And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down.
In their last sleep,- the dead reign there alone!
So shalt thou rest; and what if thou withdraw

In silence from the living, and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
Plod on, and each one, as before, will chase
His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men

The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron and maid,
And the sweet babe, and the gray-headed man
Shall, one by one, be gathered to thy side
By those who in their turn shall follow them.

So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan that moves

To the pale realms of shade, where each shall take His chamber in the silent halls of death,

-A

Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night, Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave

Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch

About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

པཎྜ

с

い

'niet wete in

B.-surrection to Iternal