the sacred voice that falls
In music o'er thy solitudes!
Within thine arms the weary heart
Is hidden from the toils of men,
And pleasure makes ambition start
Into a nobler life again.

Among the fragrant shadows throng
With all the riches of their truth,
Glad echoes from the days of youth
And mingle into laughing song;
While angel fingers touch the keys
That slumber in the silent breast,
Till mem'ry wakes her lullabies
And childhood fancies rock to rest.

Again the hours of early joy
Upon the aged years intrude,
And dance amid the summer wood
The golden dreamings of the boy;
Again the songs of wonder thrill
The days of life with gladness wild,
And lofty visions fondly fill
The longing fancies of the child.

Enchanted choirs of baby years,
Sweet dirges from the cradle's keys,
The glories of your harmonies
Impel my secret soul to tears!
The roses of my fancies fade
Into the dust of wicked strife,
And all the promise boyhood made
Has proved the desert of my life.

O, fragrant woods of happy times,
Fair children of the glowing days,
How sweet the music of your lays
Is mingled into fairy chimes!
Ye lisp again the songs of yore,
The stories of my infant years,
And throw a sweeter cadence o'er
My hoary sorrows and my tears!

LOVE.

Angelic theme of ancient lays!
By Doric hills, Athenian vales,
The nations bound thy brows with bays
And fanned thy cheeks with scented gales;
While golden lamps illumed thy shrines
Beside the Tiber and the Po,
Till anthems thine were taught to flow
Along the Alps and Appenines.

The souls of sages and of slaves
Were faithful servants unto thee,
Whose rapture soothed the Grecian waves,
And kissed the islands of the sea;
And bounding on from strand to strand
It crossed the coasts and climbed the slopes,
To place a crown of tender hopes
Upon the vine-clad Roman land.

Great empress of that early time,
Glad ruler of the gentle souls,
Each year is changed to raptured rhyme
That o'er thy laughing bosom rolls;
For cycles as they sink to rest
So closely guard thy joy and truth,
That fondness and immortal youth
Give sweet embraces to thy breast.

Thou goddess of the Paphian shrine,
Cytheran queen of Ion's isle,
Fair Venus from the land of wine,
The races love thy dewy smi