be
The sickle's accolade.

Build up an altar to the Lord,
O grateful hearts of ours!
And shape it of the greenest sward
That ever drank the showers.

Lay all the bloom of gardens there,
And there the orchard fruits;
Bring golden grain from sun and air,
From earth her goodly roots.

There let our banners droop and flow,
The stars uprise and fall;
Our roll of martyrs, sad and slow,
Let sighing breezes call.

Their names let hands of horn and tan
And rough-shod feet applaud,
Who died to make the slave a man,
And link with toil reward.

There let the common heart keep time
To such an anthem sung,
As never swelled on poet's rhyme,
Or thrilled on singer's tongue.

Song of our burden and relief
Of peace and long annoy;
The passion of our mighty grief
And our exceeding joy!

A song of praise to Him who filled
The harvests sown in tears,
And gave each field a double yield
To feed our battle-years!

A song of faith that trusts the end
To match the good begun,
Nor doubts the power of Love to blend
The hearts of men as one!

DOCTOR JOHNS.

XXXVII.

Meantime Reuben was gaining, month by month, in a knowledge of the
world,--at least of such portion of it as came within the range of his
vision in New York. He imagined it, indeed, a very large portion, and
took airs upon himself in consequence. He thought with due commiseration
of the humble people of Ashfield. He wonders how he could have tolerated
so long their simple ways. The Eagle Tavern, with its creaking
sign-board, does not loom so largely as it once did upon the horizon of
his thought. That he should ever have trembled as a lad at walking up to
the little corner bar, in company with Phil! And as for Nat Boody, whose
stories he once listened to admiringly, what a scrubby personage he has
become in his eye! Fighting-dogs, indeed! "Scamp" would be nothing to
what he has seen a score of times in the city!

He has put Phil through some of the "sights": for that great lout of a
country lad (as Reuben could not help counting him, though he liked his
big, honest heart for all that) had found him out, when he came to New
York to take ship for the West Indies.

"I say, Phil," Reuben had said, as he marched his old schoolmate up
Broadway, "it's rather a to