hear thee singing that majestic strain,
Which soothed the heart affliction could not break,
And proved the faith no worldly ills could shake;
And then I see thee join God's holy train,
But, wonder of all wonders! where the light
Breaks from a thousand suns, the seraphs, shod
With flaming sandals, lead thee; and my sight
Dims with the vision, till fresh from His rod,
I see thee lift those orbs, once quenched in night,
And gaze into the steadfast eyes of God!

CUPID TO A SKULL.

I came your way in the years gone by,
In the summers that now are old,
And then there was light in your beaming eye,
And love was living and hopes were high
At the Sign of the Heart of Gold.

I come today and the lights are fled,
And the trail of the mold and rust
Has saddened the hall where the feast was spread,
And love has vanished and youth is dead
At the Sign of the Heart of Dust.

THE PASSING RACE.

I.

Silent as ever, stoic as of old,
The scattered nomads of that dusky race
Whose story shall forever be untold,
Sit mid the ruins of their dwelling place
And watch the white man's empire grow apace.
Passive as one who knows his earthly doom,
And only waits with calm but hopeless face
The while the seasons go with blight and bloom,
So live they day by day beside their nation's tomb.

II.

In the deep woods and by the rolling streams
They made their home, and knew no other clime;
They lived their lives and dreamed barbaric dreams,
Nor heard the menace of relentless Time
As on his thunderous legions swept sublime
Bearing the torch of progress through the night,
Till lo! the primal wastes were all a-chime
With traffic's strange new music, and the might
Of busy hordes that wrought to spread the new-born light.

III.

They were strange wanderers on life's sad deep,
And paused a moment in God's mystic plan
A little vigil on time's shores to keep,
Then passed forever from the tribes of man.
They heard a voice and a strange face did scan,
And what of conquest or of kingly sway
Had filled their dreams, they gave the white man's clan,
And with the dawning of a wondrous day,
They spread their sails again and, voiceless, passed away.

IV.

Silent as ever, stoic as of old,
Their children sit with emp