Thirty years;--and you--

MARGRAVE.
Are altered, you would say. I know it well.
My hair, that then was black as midnight cloud,
Is now as white as moonbeams on the snow.
The image that my mirror gives me back
I scarce believe my own--so pale and worn.
Would you have known me had we met by chance?

GODFREY.
Ay, ay--among a million--if you spoke.
There's the old touch of kindness in your voice;
And then your eye from its dark thatch looks out
Like beacon-light, soul-kindled, as of yore.
Warm hearts will hold their own, tho' frosts of age
May lay their blighting fingers on our hair.

MARGRAVE.
Thank Heaven 'tis so!--But you are little changed,
Save the maturing touch that manhood brings
When health and strength have won the victory,
And laid their trophies on the shrine of mind!

GODFREY.
My lot has been amid the wild, fresh scenes
Of Nature's wide domain; where all is free.
Life seems t' inhale the vigorous breath required
To struggle with the elements around,
And thus keeps Time at bay. Like good old Boone,
The patriarch hunter, in the forest wilds
I've found that God supplied, and healed, and blessed.
Men live too fast in cities.

MARGRAVE.
Not if they
Would give their energies a noble aim.
The opportunities to compass good,
And good effected--these are dates that give
The sum of human life.

GODFREY.
True; most true.
It is in cities where men congregate,
And good and evil strive for mastery,
The sternest strength of soul must needs be tested.
But all that stirs the passions makes us old.
'Twould wear me out--this round of ceaseless toil,
In the same range of artificial life;
And I must greet you with a traveler's haste,
And back to my free forest home again.

MARGRAVE.
'Tis well that every part and scene in life
Can find its actors ready for the stage,
And well that our wide land has scope for all.
And yet to feel that those who raised together
Their hope-swelled canvass when life's voyage began--
Like ships, storm-parted, on the world's rough sea--
Can sail no more in sweet companionship!
'Tis a sad thought! Of all our college friends,
But one, beside myself, is here to greet you.