OLD.

Y the wayside, on a mossy When the stranger seemed to mark our play,
Some of us were joyous, some sad-hearted;

stone,

Sat a hoary pilgrim sadly I remember well, too well, that day:

musing;

Oft I marked him sitting

there alone,

All the landscape like a

page perusing-
Poor, unknown,

By the wayside, on a mossy

stone.

Oftentimes the tears unbidden started-
Would not stay-

When the stranger seemed to mark our play.

One sweet spirit broke the silent spell;

Oh, to me her name was always Heaven!
She besought him all his grief to tell
(I was then thirteen and she eleven),
Isabel.

Buckled knee and shoe and broad-brimmed One sweet spirit broke the silent spell.

There's the orchard where we used to climb. Yon white spire, a pencil on the sky.

66

There the rude three-cornered chestnut- "Oft the aisle of that old church we trod, rails Guided thither by an angel-mother; Round the pasture where the flocks were Now she sleeps beneath its sacred sod― grazing, Sire and sisters, and my little brother, Gone to God!

Where so sly I used to watch for quails

In the crops of buckwheat we were rais- Oft the aisle of that old church we trod.

ing.

Traps and trails!

There the rude three-cornered chestnut-rails.

"There I heard of Wisdom's pleasant ways

Bless the holy lesson !-but, ah never

THE FEAST OF BELSHAZZAR.

Belshazzar's impious feast; a handwriting unknown to the magicians troubleth the king. At the commendation of the queen, Daniel is brought. He, reproving the king of pride and idolatry, readeth

and interpreteth the writing.

to the Medes.

OT by one portal or one path.
alone

God's holy messages to men

are known:

The monarchy is translated
Daniel, ch. v.

Spiritless captives sinking with the chain
Have read this page and taken heart again.

From sunlight unto starlight trumpets told

Waiting the glances of his Her king's command in Babylon the old;
awful eyes,
From sunlight unto starlight, west and east,
Silver-winged seraphs do him A thousand satraps girt them for the feast,
And reined their chargers to the palace-hall

embassies,

high behest,

Guide the lone feet and glad
the failing breast;

And stars, interpreting his Where King Belshazzar held high festival-
A pleasant palace under pleasant skies,
With cloistered courts and gilded galleries,
And
gay
kiosk and painted balustrade
For winter terraces and summer shade;
By court and terrace, minaret and dome,
Euphrates, rushing from his mountain-home,
Rested his rage and curbed his crested pride
To belt that palace with his bluest tide;
Broad-fronted bulls with chiselled feathers
barred,

The rolling thunder and the raging sea
Speak the stern purpose of the Deity,
And storms beneath and rainbow-hues above
Herald his anger or proclaim his love;
The still small voices of the summer day,
The red sirocco and the breath of May,
The lingering harmony in ocean-shells,
The fairy music of the meadow-bells,
Earth and void air, water and wasting
flame,

In silent vigil keeping watch and ward,
Giants of granite wrought by cunning hand,
Guard in the gate and frown upon the land.

Have words to whisper, tongues to tell, his Not summer's glow nor yellow autumn's

Listen and learn! Tyrants have heard the And fell with lessened lustre, broken light tale, Tracing quaint arabesque of dark and white,

And turned from hearing terror-struck and Or dimly tinting on the graven stones

pale;

The pictured annals of Chaldæan thrones.