e
Where often, at eve or morn,
He lays the blooms of the garden--
He, and his youngest born.

And well I know that a brightness
From his life has passed away,
And a smile from the green earth's beauty,
And a glory from the day.

But I behold, above him,
In the far blue deeps of air,
Dim battlements shining faintly,
And a throng of faces there;

See over crystal barrier
The airy figures bend,
Like those who are watching and waiting
The coming of a friend.

And one there is among them,
With a star upon her brow,
In her life a lovely woman,
A sinless seraph now.

I know the sweet calm features;
The peerless smile I know,
And I stretch my arms with transport
From where I stand below.

And the quick tears drown my eyelids,
But the airy figures fade,
And the shining battlements darken
And blend with the evening shade.

I am gazing into the twilight
Where the dim-seen meadows lie,
And the wind of night is swaying
The trees with a heavy sigh.

THE TWO TRAVELLERS.

'Twas evening, and before my eyes
There lay a landscape gray and dim--
Fields faintly seen and twilight skies,
And clouds that hid the horizon's brim.

I saw--or was it that I dreamed?
A waking dream?--I cannot say,
For every shape as real seemed
As those which meet my eyes to-day.

Through leafless shrubs the cold wind hissed;
The air was thick with falling snow,
And onward, through the frozen mist,
I saw a weary traveller go.

Driven o'er the landscape, bare and bleak,
Before the whirling gusts of air,
The snow-flakes smote his withered cheek,
And gathered on his silver hair.

Yet on he fared through blinding snows,
And murmuring to himself he said:
"The night is near; the darkness grows,
And higher rise the drifts I tread.

"Deep, deep, each autumn flower they hide;
Each tuft of green they whelm from sight;
And they who journeyed by my side,
Are lost in the surrounding night.

"I loved them; oh, no words can tell
The love that to my friends I bore;
They left me with the sad farewell
Of those who part to meet no more.

"And I, who face this bitter wind
And o'er these snowy hillocks creep,
Must end my journey soon, and find
A frosty couch, a frozen sleep."

As thus he spoke, a thrill of pain
Shot to my heart--I closed m