SENTIMENT AND STORY.

OUR ACTS OUR ANGELS ARE.

JOHN FLETCHER.

MAN is his own star, and the soul that can
Render an honest and a perfect man
Commands all light, all influence, all fate;
Nothing to him falls early, or too late.
Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,
Our fatal shadows that walk by us still.

THE OAK.

ALFRED TENNYSON.

LIVE thy life,
Young and old,

Like yon oak,
Bright in spring,

Living gold;

Summer-rich

Then; and then
Autumn-changed,
Sober-hued,

Gold again.

189

All his leaves
Fallen at length,

Look! he stands,
Trunk and bough,
Naked strength!

LOVE, DEATH, AND REPUTATION.

FROM POEMS BY CHARLES AND MARY LAMB.

ONCE on a time, Love, Death, and Reputation,
Three travellers, a tour together went;
And, after many a long perambulation,
Agreed to part by mutual consent.

Death said: "My fellow-tourists, I am going
To seek for harvests in the embattled plain;
Where drums are beating and loud trumpets blowing,
There you'll be sure to meet with me again.'

Love said: "My friends, I mean to spend my leisure With some young couple, fresh in Hymen's bands; Or 'mongst relations, who in equal measure

Have had bequeathed to them house or lands."

But Reputation said: "If once we sever,
Our chance of future meeting is but vain;
Who parts with me must look to part forever,
For Reputation lost comes not again."

"CUI BONO?"

THOMAS CARLYLE.

WHAT is Hope? A smiling rainbow
Children follow through the wet;
'Tis not here, still yonder, yonder:
Never urchin found it yet.

What is Life? A thawing ice-board
On a sea with sunny shore:
Gay we sail; it melts beneath us;
We are sunk and seen no more.

What is Man? A foolish baby,

Vainly strives, and fights, and frets; Demanding all, deserving nothing; — One small grave is all he gets.

AN ANSWER TO "CUI BONO."

JANE WELSH CARLYLE.

NAY, this is Hope: a gentle dove
That nestles in the gentle breast,
Bringing glad tidings from above,
Of joys to come, and heavenly rest.

And this is Life: ethereal fire

Striving aloft through mouldering clay, Mounting, flaming, higher, higher! Till lost in immortality.

And Man

Oh, hate not, nor despise

The fairest, lordliest work of God!
Think not He made the good and wise
Only to sleep beneath the sod!

"CROSSING THE BAR."

ALFRED TENNYSON.

SUNSET and evening star,

And one clear call for me!

And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea!

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,

Too full for sound and foam,

When that which drew from out the boundless deep Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,

And after that the dark!

And may there be no sadness of farewell

When I embark!

For though from out our bourne of Time and Place

The flood may bear me far,

I hope to see my Pilot face to face

When I have crossed the bar.