THE LONG AGO

B. F. TAYLOR

NOTE TO THE PUPIL. Benjamin Franklin Taylor, an American poet, was born at Lowville, N. Y., in 1822. Among his works are "Songs of Yesterday,” “Old-time Pictures and Sheaves of Rhyme," "Pictures in Camp and Field," "Summer Savory," and "Between the Gates." He was for a long time connected with the Chicago Evening Journal. This selection is printed by permission of Scott, Foresman & Co.

H! a wonderful stream is the river Time,

As it runs through the realm of tears,

With a faultless rhythm and a musical rhyme
And a broader sweep and a surge sublime,
As it blends in the ocean of years.

How the winters are drifting like flakes of snow,

And the summers like birds between,

And the years in the sheaf, how they come and they go
On the river's breast with its ebb and flow,

As it glides in the shadow and sheen!

There's a magical isle up the river Time,
Where the softest of airs are playing.
There's a cloudless sky and a tropical clime,
And a song as sweet as a vesper chime,

And the Junes with the roses are straying.

And the name of this isle is the "Long Ago,"
And we bury our treasures there;

There are brows of beauty and bosoms of snow,
There are heaps of dust -oh! we love them so;
And there are trinkets

and tresses of hair.

There are fragments of songs that nobody sings,
There are parts of an infant's prayer,

There's a lute unswept and a harp without strings,
There are broken vows and pieces of rings,

And the garments our dead used to wear.

There are hands that are waved when the fairy shore
By the mirage is lifted in air,

And we sometimes hear through the turbulent roar
Sweet voices we heard in the days gone before,
When the wind down the river was fair.

Oh! remembered for aye be that blessed isle,
All the day of life until night;

And when evening glows with its beautiful smile,
And our eyes are closing in slumbers awhile,
May the greenwood of soul be in sight.

THE DEATH BED

THOMAS HOOD

NOTE TO THE PUPIL. Thomas Hood was born at London in 1799, and died there in 1845. He had few early advantages. He is unexcelled in humor and pathos, and yet there is a touch of melancholy running through his writings, that now and then predominates over all else. The selections given in this series of Choice Literature afford a good idea of his poetical writings.

WE watched her breathing through the night,

Her breathing soft and low,

As in her breast the wave of life

Kept heaving to and fro.

So silently we seemed to speak,
So slowly moved about,

As we had lent her half our powers
To eke her being out.

Our very hopes belied our fears,
Our fears our hopes belied;

We thought her dying when she slept,
And sleeping when she died.

For when the morn came, dim and sad,
And chill with early showers,
Her quiet eyelids closed-she had
Another morn than ours.

OVER THE RIVER

NANCY A. W. PRIEST

NOTE TO THE PUPIL.

Miss Priest belongs to that class of writers who have written a single poem that became popular, but nothing else of note.

VER the river they beckon to me

OVE

Loved ones who've crossed to the farther side;
The gleam of their snowy robes I see,

But their voices are drowned in the rushing tide.
There's one, with ringlets of sunny gold,

And eyes, the reflection of heaven's own blue;

He crossed in the twilight, gray and cold,

And the pale mist hid him from the mortal view.

We saw not the angels that met him there;
The gates of the city we could not see;

Over the river, over the river,

My brother stands waiting to welcome me.

Over the river the boatman pale

Carried another— the household pet;
Her brown curls waved in the gentle gale-
Darling Minnie! I see her yet!

She crossed on her bosom her dimpled hands,
And fearlessly entered the phantom bark;
We watched it glide from the silver sands,

And all our sunshine grew strangely dark.
We know she is safe on the farther side,
Where all the ransomed and angels be;
Over the river, the mystic river,

My childhood's idol is waiting for me.

For none return from those quiet shores,
Who cross with the boatman cold and pale;
We hear the dip of the golden oars,

And catch a gleam of the snowy sail,

And, lo! they have passed from our yearning hearts,
They cross the stream, and are gone for aye;
We may not sunder the veil apart

That hides from our vision the gates of day;
We only know that their bark no more

May sail with us o'er life's stormy sea;
Yet, somewhere, I know, on the unseen shore,
They watch, and beckon, and wait for me.

And I sit and think, when the sunset's gold
Is flushing river, and hill, and shore,
I shall one day stand by the water cold,

And list for the sound of the boatman's oar;
I shall watch for a gleam of the flapping sail;
I shall hear the boat as it gains the strand;
I shall pass from sight with the boatman pale,
To the better shore of the spirit land;

I shall know the loved who have gone before,

And joyfully sweet will the meeting be,
When over the river, the peaceful river,
The angel of death shall carry me.

GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS

1824-1892

GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS was born in Providence, R. I. He came to New York in his early boyhood. His schooling was very brief. For two years he was at Brook Farm. After this he spent a year on a farm at Concord, Mass. The next four years he spent in Europe. At the age of twenty-seven he began his life work as editor, author, and public speaker. He published, within a year, "The Nile Notes of a Howadji" and "The Howadji in Syria." For two years he was on the New York Tribune, where Dana and Ripley, two of his Brook Farm friends, were employed. While on that paper he wrote "Lotus Eating," a series of letters from famous watering places. Later he became one of the editors of Putnam's Magazine. During this time he wrote "Potiphar Papers" and "Prue and I." At this time he became interested in a publishing business, which failed. He assumed debts quite beyond what the law would have required of him, and which it took him a score of years to pay. This act was characteristic of the man. After the failure of his publishing venture, he was a contributor to Harper's Magazine and Harper's Weekly. Later he became the editor of the Weekly and writer of the "Easy Chair,” positions which he held till his death. This work, and his lectures and addresses, occupied his time. During his life Curtis was better known as a lecturer and public speaker than as a writer. He was one of the most popular of Lyceum lecturers, and also took great interest in political questions, and made many political addresses. He was especially active in opposition to slavery, and later was greatly interested in the reform of the civil service.

The following selection is from George William Curtis' Works, published and copyrighted by Harper and Brothers.