THE GLOVE AND THE LIONS.-L. HUNT. KING Francis was a hearty king, and lov'd a royal sport, And truly 'twas a gallant thing to see that crowning show, Ramp'd and roar'd the lions, with horrid laughing jaws ; their paws: With wallowing might and stifled roar, they roll'd on one another, Till all the pit, with sand and mane, was in a thund'rous smother; The bloody foam above the bars came whizzing thro' the air; Said Francis then, "Faith! gentlemen, we're better here than there!" De Lorge's love o'er-heard the king, a beauteous lively dame, With smiling lips and sharp bright eyes, which always seem'd the same; She thought,―The Count my lover is brave as brave can be— He surely would do wondrous things to show his love of me: King, ladies, lovers, all look on; the occasion is divine! I'll drop my glove, to prove his love; great glory will be mine! She dropp'd her glove, to prove his love, then look'd at him and smil❜d; He bow'd, and in a moment leap'd among the lions wild. place, Then threw the glove-but not with love-right in the lady's face. "By heaven!" cried Francis, "rightly done !" and he rose from where he sat: "No love," quoth he, "but vanity, sets love a task like that!" PATIENCE AND HOPE.-BULWER. UPON a barren steep, I saw an angel watching the wild sea; Time was that stormy deep, And the opposing shore-Eternity! "Why dost thou watch the wave? The tide engulphs thee, if thou do remain." I wait until the waters ebb again." Hush'd on the Angel's breast O angel, to thy breast?" "The child God gave me in the long ago! "Mine all upon the earth -The angel's angel birth, Smiling all terror from the howling wild !"— Never may I forget The dream that haunts me yet Of PATIENCE nursing HOPE-the Angel and the Child! ABOU BEN ADHEM AND THE ANGEL.-LEIGH HUNT. ABOU BEN ADHEM (may his tribe increase!) An angel writing in a book of gold. Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold; “What writest thou ?"—The vision rais'd its head, Answer'd, "The names of those who love the Lord!" And show'd the names whom love of God had bless'd; COXCOMBRY IN CONVERSATION.-COWPER. THE emphatic speaker dearly loves to oppose, A tasteless journal of the day before. Call'd on a friend, drank tea, stepp'd home agalli, I cannot talk with civet in the room,— A fine puss gentleman, that's all perfume: His odoriferous attempts to please, Perhaps might prosper with a swarm of bees; Owes all its weight, like loaded dice, to lead. But, when unpack'd, your disappointment groans, YESTERDAY.-TUPPer. SPEAK, poor almsman, of to-day, whom none can assure of a to-morrow, Tell out, with honest heart, the price thou settest upon yesterday. Is it then a writing in the dust, traced by the finger of Idleness Is it as the pale blue smoke, rising from a peasant's hovel, Is it but a vision, unstable and unreal, which wise men soon forget? Is it as the stranger of the night,-gone, we heed not whither? Alas! thou foolish heart, whose thoughts are but as these, Alas! deluded soul, that hopeth thus of yesterday! For behold—those temples of Ellora, the Brahmin's rock-built shrine, Behold-yon granite cliff, which the North Sea buffeteth in vain, That stout old forest fir-these waking verities of life, This guest abiding ever, not strange, nor a servant, but a son,Such, O man, are vanity and dreams, transient as a rainbow on the cloud, Weigh'd against that solid fact, thine ill-remember'd yesterday. Come, let me show thee an ensample, where Nature shall instruct us. Luxuriantly the arguments for Truth spring native in her gardens; Seek we yonder woodman of the plain; he is measuring his axe to the elm, And anon the sturdy strokes ring upon the wintry air; Eagerly the village school-boys cluster on the tighten'd rope, Shouting, and bending to the pull, or lifted from the ground elastic, The huge tree boweth like Sisera boweth to its foes with faintness, Its sinews crack,-deep groans declare the reeling anguish of Goliath ; The wedge is driven home,-and the saw is at its heart, and lo! with solemn slowness, The shuddering monarch riseth from his throne,-toppled with a crash, and is fallen! Now, shall the mangled stump teach proud man a lesson; Now, can we from that elm-tree's sap distil the wine of Truth. Heed ye those hundred rings, concentric from the core, Eddying in various waves to the red bark's shore-like rim? These be the gatherings of yesterdays, present all to-day, |