68

THE DIAL OF FLOWERS.

So might the days have been brightly told-
Those days of song and dreams-
When shepherds gather'd their flocks of old
By the blue Acadian streams.

So in those isles of delight, that rest
Far off in a breezeless main,

Which many a bark with a weary quest,
Has sought, but still in vain.

Yet is not life, in its real flight,

Mark'd thus-even thus--on earth,
By the closing of one hope's delight
And another's gentle birth?

Oh! let us live, so that flower by flower,
Shutting in turn may leave

A lingering still for the sunset hour,

A charm for the shaded eve.

Mrs. Hemans.

BRIDGES AND WINGS.

EACH Song I send thee is a bridge,
Built by thy happy lover,-

A golden bridge, by which my love
To thee, sweet child, comes over.

And all my dreams have angel-wings,
Made up of smiles and sighing;
Lighter tha, air, on which my love
To thee, dear heart, comes flying.

-From "Exotics."

Translated by

James Freeman Clarke.

70

FERNS.

WHAT though no gaudy hue attract the eye,
Endow'd with form of justest symmetry,

The breeze of spring no lov'lier thing hath fann'd,
Than the light foliage of the feathery band

Of ferns; who crowd the heath, or deep recess

Of many a grove and tangled wilderness,
With their green vases; form'd to vie with those
Which Grecian art, fond and exulting chose
To crown the graceful pillar ;-and to me,
Far-famed Acanthus, not less fair than thee
(Such as I know thee, sculptured with nice hand),
Rise the slight fern-plants of my native land.

Eleanor Henslow.

MOSS ROSES AND FORGET-ME-NOTS.