g-girls of the
neighborhood were there, bright as so many butterflies, laughing, and
nodding, and whispering one another, and dropping their eyes before the
young sailors, and teamsters, and other fine fellows, who were serving
them with a generosity that was only equalled by their admiration.
Coffee, cakes, cheese, chowder, bottled beer, fruits, and hot
bannocks,--the lasses had them all at once, and the lads would have been
glad to give them even more.

And John, grown ten years younger that day, kept all the while (being
forced to turn his head away now and then to receive congratulations)
one foot under the table, and against the soft slipper and silken
stocking of Rose, lest at any moment she might be caught up into heaven,
and so vanish out of his sight; and she, in turn, kept fond watch of
him, pressing the oranges upon him with almost importunate solicitude.
Perhaps she remembered that one which he had parted with for her sake,
when he used to look down upon her from the roof of Baker's Row with
such hopeless and helpless admiration.

ARE THE CHILDREN AT HOME?

Each day when the glow of sunset
Fades in the western sky,
And the wee ones, tired of playing,
Go tripping lightly by,
I steal away from my husband,
Asleep in his easy-chair,
And watch from the open doorway
Their faces fresh and fair.

Alone in the dear old homestead
That once was full of life,
Ringing with girlish laughter,
Echoing boyish strife,
We two are waiting together;
And oft, as the shadows come,
With tremulous voice he calls me,
"It is night! are the children home?"

"Yes, love!" I answer him gently,
"They're all home long ago";--
And I sing, in my quivering treble,
A song so soft and low,
Till the old man drops to slumber,
With his head upon his hand,
And I tell to myself the number
Home in the better land.

Home, where never a sorrow
Shall dim their eyes with tears!
Where the smile of God is on them
Through all the summer years!

I know!--yet my arms are empty,
That fondly folded seven,
And the mother heart within me
Is almost starved for heaven.

Sometimes, in the dusk of evening,
I only shut my eyes,
And the children are all about me,
A vision from the skies:
The babes whose dimpled fingers
Lost the way to my breast,