Father, I would not dare to choose
A longer life, an earlier death;
I know not what my soul might lose
By shortened or protracted breath.

These Border-Lands are calm and still,
And solemn are their silent shades;
And my heart welcomes them, until

The light of life's long evening fades.

I hear them spoken of with dread,
As fearful and unquiet places ;
Shades, where the living and the dead
Look sadly in each other's faces.

But since Thy hand hath led me here,
And I have seen the Border-Land;
Seen the dark river flowing near,

Stood on its brink, as now I stand;

There has been nothing to alarm

My trembling soul; how could I fear While thus encircled with Thine arm? I never felt Thee half so near.

What should appal me in a piace

That brings me hourly nearer Thee? When I may almost see Thy faceSurely 'tis here my soul would be.

EUPHEMIA SAXBY.

STARLIGHT.

DARKLING, methinks, the path of life is grown,

And Solitude and Sorrow close around;

My fellow-travellers one by one are gone,

Their home is reached, but mine must still be found The sun that set as the last bowed his head

To cross the threshold of his resting-place, Has left the world devoid of all that made

Its business, pleasure, happiness, and grace. But I have still the desert path to trace;

Not with the day has my day's work an end; And winds and shadows through the cold air chase, And earth looks dark where walked we, friend with friend.

And yet thus wildered, not without a guide,
I wander on amid the shades of night;

My home-fires gleam, methinks, and round them glide
My friends at peace, far off, but still in sight;
For through the closing gloom mine eyesight goes
Further in heaven than when the day was bright;
And there, as Earth still dark and darker grows,
Shines out, for every shade, a world of light.

MRS. ARCHER CLIVE

DEATH AND IMMORTALITY.

PRAYER AND THE DEAD.

THEY passed away from sight and hand,

A slow, successive train:

To memory's heart, a gathered band,
Our lost ones come again.

Not back to earth, a second time
The mortal path to tread :
They walk in their appointed clime,
The dead, but not the dead.

Their spirits up to God we gave,
With eyes as wet as dim ;
Confiding in His power to save,
For all do live to Him.

Beyond all we can know or think,
Beyond the earth and sky,

Beyond Time's lone and dreaded brink,
Their deathless dwellings lie.

Dear thoughts that once our union made,
Death does not disallow:

We prayed for them while here they stayed, And what shall hinder now?

Our Father! give them perfect day,
And portions with the blest;
Oh, pity, if they went astray,
And pardon for the best!

As they may need, still deign to bring
The helping of thy grace,
The shadow of thy guardian wing,
Or shining of thy face.

For all their sorrows here below,
Be boundless joy and peace;
For all their love, a heavenly glow
That nevermore shall cease.

O Lord of Souls! when ours shall part,
To try the farther birth,
Let Faith go journeying with the heart
To those we loved on earth.

N. L. FROTHINGHAM

FROM "IN MEMORIAM."

XCII.

How pure at heart and sound in head,

With what divine affections bold,

Should be the man whose thought would hold

An hour's communion with the dead.

In vain shalt thou, or any, call
The spirits from their golden day,
Except, like them, thou too canst say
My spirit is at peace with all.

They haunt the silence of the breast,
Imaginations calm and fair,

The memory like a cloudless air,
The conscience as a sea at rest:

But when the heart is full of din,
And doubt beside the portal waits,
They can but listen at the gates
And hear the household jar within.

OUT OF THE DEPTHS.

ALFRED TEnnyson

THOU

HOU that art strong to comfort, look on me! I sit in darkness, and behold no light! Over my heart the waves of agony

Have gone, and left me faint! Forbear to smite A bruised and broken reed! Sustain, sustain, Divinest Comforter, to Thee I fly;

Let me not fly in vain!

Support me with Thy love, or else I die!
Whate'er I had was Thine!

A God of mercy Thou hast ever been ;
Assist me to resign,

And if I murmur, count it not for sin !