t to sea like chaff.

The sun was going down, a mere redness in the curdling fleecy haze; the
weltering seas rose and fell in broad sheets of burnished silver, the
monotone of their music followed them, a cool salt wind blew over them
and freshened them for storm. Flor rose on her arm and looked back,--the
breeze roused her; pain and fear and hope rose with her and looked back
too. Eager, feverish, fierce, recollecting and desiring and imprecating,
her dry lips parted for a shriek that the dryer throat had at first no
power to utter. In such wild longing pangs it seemed her heart would
burst as it beat. The low land, the great gunboats, all were receding,
and she was washing out to sea, a weed.--Well, then, wash!

* * * * *

The stem of the boat rose lightly, riding over the rollers; the sturdy
arms kept flashing stroke; the great gulfs gaped for a life, no matter
whose; night would darken down on them soon;--pull with a will!

They heard her voice as they drew near: she had found it again, singing,
as the swan sings his death-song, loud and clear,--singing to herself
some song of her old happy dancing-days, while the spray powdered over
her and one broad wave lifted and tossed her on to the next,--no note of
sorrow in the song, and no regret.

It was but brief delay beside her; then they pulled back, the wind
piping behind them,--nearer to that purple cloud with its black plume of
smoke, up the side and over; all the white faces crowding round her,
pallid blots; one dark face smiling on her like Sarp's; friendship and
succor everywhere about her; and over her, blowing out broadly upon the
stormy wind, that flag whose starry shadow nowhere shelters a slave.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

SUMMER, 1865.

Dead is the roll of the drums,
And the distant thunders die,
They fade in the far-off sky;
And a lovely summer comes,
Like the smile of Him on high.

Lulled the storm and the onset.
Earth lies in a sunny swoon;
Stiller splendor of noon,
Softer glory of sunset,
Milder starlight and moon!

For the kindly Seasons love us;
They smile over trench and clod,
(Where we left the bravest of us,)--
There's a brighter green of the sod,
And a holier calm above us
In the blessed Blue of God.

The roar and ravage were vain;
And Nature, that never yields,
Is busy with sun and rain
At her old