ration, kindling
Into loftiest speech or song,
Still through all the listening ages
Pours its torrent swift and strong.

As to-day in sculptured marble
Side by side the Poets stand,
So they stood in life's great struggle,
Side by side and hand to hand,

In the ancient German city,
Dowered with many a deathless name,
Where they dwelt and toiled together,
Sharing each the other's fame:

One till evening's lengthening shadows
Gently stilled his faltering lips,
But the other's sun at noonday
Shrouded in a swift eclipse.

There their names are household treasures,
And the simplest child you meet
Guides you where the house of Goethe
Fronts upon the quiet street;

And, hard by, the modest mansion
Where full many a heart has felt
Memories uncounted clustering
Round the words, "Here Schiller dwelt."

In the churchyard both are buried,
Straight beyond the narrow gate,
In the mausoleum sleeping
With Duke Charles in sculptured state.

For the Monarch loved the Poets,
Called them to him from afar,
Wooed them near his court to linger,
And the planets sought the star.

He, his larger gifts of fortune
With their larger fame to blend,
Living, counted it an honor
That they named him as their friend;

Dreading to be all-forgotten,
Still their greatness to divide,
Dying, prayed to have his Poets
Buried one on either side.

But this suited not the gold-laced
Ushers of the royal tomb,
Where the princely House of Weimar
Slumbered in majestic gloom.

So they ranged the coffins justly,
Each with fitting rank and stamp,
And with shows of court precedence
Mocked the grave's sepulchral damp.

Fitly now the clownish sexton
Narrow courtier-rules rebukes;
First he shows the grave of Goethe,
Schiller's next, and last--the Duke's.

Vainly 'midst these truthful shadows
Pride would daunt her painted wing;
Here the Monarch waits in silence,
And the Poet is the King!

THE LIBRARIAN'S STORY.

Librarians are a singular class of men,--or rather, a class of singular
men. I choose the latter phrase, because I think that the singularities
do not arise from the employment, but characterize the men who are most
likely to gravitate toward it. A great philosopher, whom nobody knows,
once stated the Problem of Humanity thus: "There are two kinds of
people,--