strength was soaring,
The paltry earth beneath ignoring.

Swift did his wings his will obey;
Straight north by east he coursed his way;
Proudly he took his fearless flight,
Toward fair Monadnock's hazy height.

Then on this rugged mountain wall,
A deeper silence seemed to fall:
Over this road, though broad and wide,
No traveller was seen to ride.

Only in vision rumbled by
A creaking coach with driver high,
Who cracked his whip, and rang his cheers--
Echoes they were of other years.

A group of graves were clustered here;
The wind wailed o'er them wild and drear:--
Could souls rise higher to the Light
When soaring from this mountain height?

And as I mused, the twilight fell:
I heard a distant evening bell;
And in the valley far below,
I heard the home-bound cattle low.

Far down where winds the Deerfield stream,
I saw a light,--a sudden gleam,
As up the narrow river riding
The Western train came swiftly gliding.

Then full to Hoosac's height it came,
When, with a sudden flare of flame,
Boldly the barrier it defied
And plunged into the mountain side.

The train was lost to sound and sight,
But still I knew it kept its flight:
I marked its subterranean way;--
Below the little graveyard lay.

Ah! trav'ller, through this cavern deep,
Fast in thy thoughts or book asleep,
Dost know that high above thy head
There rest the ashes of the dead?

[Illustration]

A VERITABLE TRADER.

BY A. T. S.

A little remote from the centre of a village, on that strip of seacoast
in the southeastern part of New Hampshire, lived a self-made trader,
Joshua Jackson. He occupied a small, unpainted house, two stories in
front, with the roof sloping down at the back part to one story. In the
rear was the barn, with its generous red door, a well with its long
"sweep," a pig-pen, and a hen-pen; but the hens seemed equally or more
at home in the barn, with liberty of the yard, and sometimes they took a
peep of curiosity into the back entry of the house.

Here, with his mother, lived Joshua Jackson, familiarly known as "Uncle
Josh." It is a kind instinct which makes humanity in the rural districts
claim, as uncle or aunt, any single man or woman who is left one side of
the common lot of marriage and its ties. It is a relationship accepted
in silent, good-natured consent o