Yea, though one praise and love, or all forget,
That stark thing recks not, that but now was I.
Ah! so in dreams tired life affects content,
And wakes rebellious. “Not for this were sent,
My God," she cries, “ Thy beauty and Thy Love,
That strove within me towards accomplishment."

HER CONFIRMATION.
WHEN my Clorinda walks in white
Unto her Confirmation rite,

What sinless dove can show to heaven
A purer sight?
Beneath a lawn, translucent crown,
Her lovely curls conceal their brown;

Her wanton eyes are fastened, even
Demurely down.
And that delicious mouth of rose
No words, no smile, may discompose;

All of her feels the approaching awe,
And silent grows.
Come, then, Thou noiseless Spirit, and rest
Here, where she waits Thee for her Guest;

Pass not, but sweetly onward draw,
Till heaven's possessed !

URBANUS LOQUITUR.
LET others sing the country's charm;

The whispering trees, the tangled lane,
The perfume burdened air, the trills

Of lark and nightingale; the wain
That homeward brings the scented hay,
When evening's peace absorbs the day.
Let others laud those primal cares,

Which fill the country hours with bliss;
The timely rest; clear eyes that greet

Earth waking 'neath Aurora's kiss ;
The easy, sauntering walk; the toil,
That waits upon the bounteous soil.
Let others paint with fresh delight

The country maiden's cheek of rose;
VOL. XII. - 20

Her lover's artless, amorous gift,

Which pure affection's heart inclose;
The children nestling round their sire
At night-fall, by the winter's fire.
For me, for me another world's

Enchantments hold my heart in thrall; Those London pavements, lowering sky,

Store secrets, on mine eyes that fall,
More curious far, than earth or air
By country paths can make appear.
The stern reformer scowls aghast

Mid the doomed city's trackless woe:
A pelles veils his shuddering gaze,

Its ugliness “offends him so."
The dainty-eared musician dies
In torment, of its rancous cries.
Yet there are souls of coarser grain,

Or else more flexible, who find
Strange, infinite, allurements lurk,

Undreamed of by the simple mind,
Along these streets, within the walls
Of cafés, shops, and music halls.
'Twixt jar of tongues, at endless strife

On art, religion, social needs,
How many a keen thought springs to birth

In him, this dubious book who reads ! For curious eyes no hours are spent, That bring not interest, content. I'll call not these the best, nor those ;

The country fashions, or the town; On each descend heaven's bounteous rains,

On each the impartial sun looks down. Why should we gird and argue, friend; Not follow where our natures tend ? The secret's this; where'er our lot,

To read, mark, learn, digest them well; The devious paths we mortals take

To gain, at length, our heaven or hell: Alike in some still, rural scene On Regent Street and Bethnal Green.

JEAN INGELOW, an English poet and romance-writer, born at Boston, Lincolnshire, in 1830; died at Kensington, July 20, 1897. Her first publication was “ Tales of Orris ” (1860). Her father was a banker and a man of superior intellectual culture. As a child Miss Ingelow was exceedingly shy and reserved. She first came into public notice as a poet when her volume of poems containing “ Divided," “ High Tide on the Coast of Lincolnshire," and the “Songs of Seven," was published in 1863, and the author secured

immediate recognition as a poet of high rank. She published “A Story of Doom, and Other Poems” (1867); “ Monitions of the Unseen” and “Poems of Love and Childhood " (1870), and “Poems of the Old Days and the New” (1885). She wrote several works for the young, among which were “Studies for Stories" (1864); “ Poor Matt" (1866); “Stories told to a Child,” two series (18661872); “ A Sister's Bye-Hours ” (1868); “ Mopsa the Fairy" (1869); “ Little Wonder-Horn” (1872); “Home Thoughts and Home Scenes,” “ The Suspicious Jackdaw,” “The Grandmother's Shoe," “ The Golden Opportunity,” “ The Moorish Gold," "The Minnows with Silver Tails," “ Two Ways of Telling a Story," “ The Wild Duck Shooter.” Her second series of poems was published in 1876, and her third series in 1885. She was also the author of several novels: “Off the Skelligs” (1873); “Fated to be Free" (1874); “ Sarah de Berenger” (1881);“ Don John” (1881); “ John Jerome" (1886), and “A Motto Changed ” (1894). During the latter part of her life Miss Ingelow lived in London, and three times a week she gave what she called a “copyright dinner” to twelve needy persons just discharged from the hospitals.

Miss Ingelow's writings were popular in America, as well as in England. In 1874 her poems had reached a sale of 98,000 copies in this country. She was a writer of the widest popularity. She had among other requisites for poetical composition what the critics called the gift of clear, strong, and simple language, and her pictures showed at once accurate observation of nature combined with a strong sympathy with the common interests of life.

SONGS OF SEVEN.
SEVEN TIMES ONE. EXULTATION.
THERE's no dew left on the daisies and clover,

There's no rain left in heaven:
I've said my “seven times," over and over,

Seven times one are seven.

I am old, so old, I can write a letter;

My birthday lessons are done;
The lambs play always, they know no better;

They are only one times one.
O moon! in the night I have seen you sailing

And shining so round and low;
You were bright! ah, bright! but your light is failing, --

You are nothing now but a bow.
You moon, have you done something wrong in heaven

That God has hidden your face?
I hope if you have you will soon be forgiven,

And shine again in your place.
O velvet bee, you're a dusty fellow,

You've powdered your legs with gold !
O brave marsh marybuds, rich and yellow,

Give me your money to hold !
O columbine, open your folded wrapper,

Where two twin turtle-doves dwell!
O cuckoopint, toll me the purple clapper

That hangs in your clear green bell!
And show me your nest with the young ones in it;

I will not steal them away;
I am old ! you may trust me, linnet, linnet-

I am seven times one to-day.

SEVEN TIMES TWO. ROMANCE.
You bells in the steeple, ring, ring out your changes,

How many soever they be,
And let the brown meadow-lark's note as he ranges

Come over, come over to me.
Yet birds' clearest carol by fall or by swelling

No magical sense conveys,

And bells have forgotten their old art of telling

The fortune of future days.
* Turn again, turn again,” once they rang cheerily,

While a boy listened alone;
Made his heart yearn again, musing so wearily

All by himself on a stone.
Poor bells ! I forgive you; your good days are over,

And mine, they are yet to be;
No listening, no longing shall aught, aught discover.

You leave the story to me.
The foxglove shoots out of the green matted heather,

Preparing her hoods of snow;
She was idle, and slept till the sunshiny weather:

O, children take long to grow.
I wish and I wish that the spring would go faster,

Nor long summer bide so late;
And I could grow on like the foxglove and aster,

For some things are ill to wait.

I wait for the day when dear hearts shall discover,

While dear hands are laid on my head; “The child is a woman, the book may close over,

For all the lessons are said.”

I wait for my story — the birds cannot sing it,

Not one, as he sits on the tree;
The bells cannot ring it, but long years, O bring it !

Such as I wish it to be.

SEVEN TIMES THREE. LOVE.
I leaned out of window, I smelt the white clover,

Dark, dark was the garden, I saw not the gate; “Now, if there be footsteps, he comes, my one lover — Hush, nightingale, hush! O. sweet nightingale, wait

Till I listen and hear
If a step draweth near,

For my love he is late ! “ The skies in the darkness stoop nearer and nearer,

A cluster of stars hangs like fruit in the tree,
The fall of the water comes sweeter, comes clearer:

To what art thou listening, and what dost thou see?