t.
Kiss but the crystal's mystic rim,
Each shadow rends its flowery chain,
Springs in a bubble from its brim,
And walks the chambers of the brain.

Poor Beauty! time and fortune's wrong
No form nor feature may withstand,--
Thy wrecks are scattered all along,
Like emptied sea-shells on the sand;--
Yet, sprinkled with this blushing rain,
The dust restores each blooming girl,
As if the sea-shells moved again
Their glistening lips of pink and pearl.

Here lies the home of school-boy life,
With creaking stair and wind-swept hall,
And, scarred by many a truant knife,
Our old initials on the wall;
Here rest--their keen vibrations mute--
The shout of voices known so well,
The ringing laugh, the wailing flute,
The chiding of the sharp-tongued bell.

Here, clad in burning robes, are laid
Life's blossomed joys, untimely shed;
And here those cherished forms have strayed
We miss awhile, and call them dead.
What wizard fills the maddening glass?
What soil the enchanted clusters grew,
That buried passions wake and pass
In beaded drops of fiery dew?

Nay, take the cup of blood-red wine,--
Our hearts can boast a warmer glow,
Filled from a vintage more divine,--
Calmed, but not chilled by winter's snow!
To-night the palest wave we sip
Rich as the priceless draught shall be
That wet the bride of Cana's lip,--
The wedding wine of Galilee!

CHILD-LIFE BY THE GANGES.

We are told--and, being philosophers, we will amuse ourselves by
believing--that there are towns in India, somewhere between Cape Comorin
and the Himalayas, wherein everything is _butcha_,--that is, "a little
chap"; where inhabitants and inhabited are alike in the estate of
urchins; where little Brahmins extort little offerings from little dupes
at the foot of little altars, and ring little bells, and blow little
horns, and pound little gongs, and mutter little rigmaroles before
stupid little Krishnas and Sivas and Vishnus, doing their little wooden
best to look solemn, mounted on little bulls or snakes, under little
canopies; where little Brahminee bulls, in all the little insolence of
their little sacred privileges, poke their little noses into the little
rice-baskets of pious little maidens in little bazaars, and help their
little selves to their little hearts' content, without "begging your
little pardons," or "by your little leaves"; where