CHRISTMAS is here; Icy and chill, Little care we; Once on the boughs Here let us sport, And pledge a hand to all young friends, Good-night! I'd say the griefs, the joys, Are but repeated in our age; men, Your pangs or pleasures of fifteen I'd say we suffer and we strive And in the world, as in the school, I'd say how fate may change and shift, The prize be sometimes with the fool, The race not always to the swift; The strong may yield, the good may fall, The great man be a vulgar clown, The knave be lifted over all, The kind cast pitilessly down. Who knows the inscrutable design? Be weeping at her darling's grave? THE IVY GREEN This crowns his feast with wine and wit- Or hunger hopeless at the gate. So each shall mourn, in life's advance, Pray God the heart may kindly glow, Come wealth or want, come good or ill, And bear it with an honest heart. Go, lose or conquer as you can; But if you fail, or if you rise, Be each, pray God, a gentleman. A gentleman, or old or young! (Bear kindly with my humble lays ;) The sacred chorus first was sung Upon the first of Christmas days; The shepherds heard it overhead The joyful angels rais'd it then : Glory to heaven on high, it said, And peace on earth to gentle men! My song, save this, is little worth; And wish you health, and love, and mirth, Be this, good friends, our carol still : Charles Dickens Uн, a dainty plant is the Ivy green, Of right choice food are his meals I ween, The wall must be crumbled, the stone decayed, To pleasure his dainty whim; And the mouldering dust that years have made Is a merry meal for him. Creeping where no life is seen, A FLOATING, a floating "Oh, came you from the isles of Greece Or from the banks of Seine ; Or off some tree in forests free, "I came not off the old world "Oh, sing and wake the dawning - "The current sweeps the old world, The wind will blow, the dawn will glow, Ere thou hast sail'd them through. THE DEAD CHURCH WILD, wild wind, wilt thou never cease thy sighing? Dark, dark night, wilt thou never wear away? Cold, cold church, in thy death sleep lying, Thy Lent is past, thy Passion here, but not thine Easterday. Peace, faint heart, though the night be| Echoing softly their laughter; around them dark and sighing; Aw'D by her own rash words she was still and her eyes to the seaward Look'd for an answer of wrath: far off, in the heart of the darkness, Bright white mists rose slowly; beneath them the wandering ocean Glimmer'd and glow'd to the deepest abyss; and the knees of the maiden Trembled and sank in her fear, as afar, like a dawn in the midnight, Rose from their seaweed chamber the choir of the mystical sea-maids. Onward toward her they came, and her heart beat loud at their coming, Watching the bliss of the gods, as waken'd the cliffs with their laughter. Onward they came in their joy, and before them the roll of the surges Sank, as the breeze sank dead, into smooth green foam-fleck'd marble, Aw'd; and the crags of the cliff, and the pines of the mountain were silent. Onward they came in their joy, and around them the lamps of the seanymphs, Myriad fiery globes, swam panting and heaving; and rainbows, Crimson and azure and emerald, were broken in star-showers, lighting Far through the wine-dark depths of the crystal, the gardens of Nereus, Coral and sea-fan and tangle, the blooms and the palms of the ocean. Onward they came in their joy, more white than the foam which they scatter'd, Laughing and singing, and tossing and twining, while eager, the Tritons Blinded with kisses their eyes, unreprov'd, and above them in worship Hover'd the terns, and the seagulls swept past them on silvery pinions the wantoning dolphins Sigh'd as they plunged, full of love; and the great sea-horses which bore them Curv'd up their crests in their pride to the delicate arms of the maiden, Pawing the spray into gems, till the fiery rainfall, unharming, Sparkled and gleam'd on the limbs of the nymphs, and the coils of the mermen. Onward they went in their joy, bath'd round with the fiery coolness, Needing nor sun nor moon, self-lighted, immortal: but others, Pitiful, floated in silence apart; in their bosoms the sea-boys, Slain by the wrath of the seas, swept down by the anger of Nereus ; Hapless, whom never again on strand or on quay shall their mothers Welcome with garlands and vows to the temple, but wearily pining Gaze over island and bay for the sails of the sunken; they heedless Sleep in soft bosoms forever, and dream of the surge and the sea-maids. Onward they pass'd in their joy; on their brows neither sorrow nor anger; Self-sufficing, as gods, never heeding the woe of the maiden. THE LAST BUCCANEER Он, England is a pleasant place for them that 's rich and high; But England is a cruel place for such poor folks as I; And such a port for mariners I ne'er shall see again, As the pleasant Isle of Avès, beside the Spanish main. There were forty craft in Avès that were both swift and stout, All furnish'd well with small arms and cannons round about; And a thousand men in Avès made laws so fair and free To choose their valiant captains and obey them loyally. Thence we sail'd against the Spaniard with |