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A long and a weary way I had come;

On the northern accents that dwell on thy tongue.

To me they are music, to me they recall

The things long hidden by memory's pall!

But I stopped, methought, by mine own sweet home; I stood by the hearth, and my father sat there, With a pale, thin face, and snow white hair!

The Bible lay open upon his knee,

But he closed the book to welcome me.
He led me next where my mother lay,

And together we knelt by her grave to pray,
And heard a hymn it was heaven to hear,
For it echoed one of my young days dear.
This dream has waked feelings long, long since fled,
And hopes which I deemed in my heart were dead,
-We have not spoken, but still I have hung

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The Maiden Sat at Her Busy Wheel.

'HE maiden sat at her busy wheel,

THE

Her heart was light and free,

And ever in cheerful song broke forth
Her bosom's harmless glee:

Her song was in mockery of love,

And oft I heard her say,

"The gathered rose and the stolen heart
Can charm but for a day."

I looked on the maiden's rosy cheek,
And her lip so full and bright,

And I sighed to think that the traitor love
Should conquer a heart so light:

But she thought not of the future days of woe,
While she caroled in tones so gay-
"The gathered rose and the stolen heart
Can charm but for a day."

A year passed on, and again I stood
By the humble cottage door;

The maiden sat at her busy wheel,
But her look was blithe no more;
The big tear stood in her downcast eye,
And with sighs I heard her say,
"The gathered rose and the stolen heart
Can charm but for a day."

Oh, well I knew what had dimmed her eye
And made her cheek so pale;
The maid had forgotten her early song,

While she listened to love's soft tale;
She had tasted the sweets of his poisoned cup,
It had wasted her life away—
And the stolen heart, like the gathered rose,
Had charmed but for a day.

-Emma C. Embury.

THESE

Ability and Opportunity.

HESE are the conditions of success. Give a man power and a field in which to use it, and he must accomplish something. He may not do and become all that he desires and dreams of, but his life cannot be a failure. I never hear men complaining of the want of ability. The most unsuccessful think that they could do great things if they only had the chance. Somehow or other something or somebody has always been in the way. Providence has hedged them in so that they could not carry out their plans. They knew just how to get rich, but they lacked opportunity.

Sit down by one who thus complains, and ask him to tell you the story of his life. Before he gets half through he will give you occasion to ask him, "Why didn't you do so at that time? Why didn't you stick to that piece of land and improve it, or to that business and develop it? Is not the present owner of that property rich? Is not the man who took up the business you abandoned successful?" He will probably reply: "Yes, that was an opportunity; but I did not think so then. I saw it when it was too late." In telling his story he will probably say, of his own accord, half a dozen times: "If I had known how things were going to turn I might have done as well as Mr. A. That farm of his was offered to me. I knew that it was a good one, and cheap, but I knew that it would require a great deal of hard work to get it cleared and fenced, to plant trees, vines, etc., and to secure water for irrigation. I did not like to undertake it. I am sorry now that I didn't. It was one of my opportunities."

The truth is, God gives to all of us ability and opportunities enough to enable us to be moderately successful. If we fail, in ninety-five cases out of a hundred it is our own fault. We neglect to improve the talents with which our Creator endowed us, or we failed to enter

the door that he opened for us. of opportunities, that they will

A man cannot expect that his whole life shall be made up meet him at regular intervals as he goes on, like milestones by the roadside. Usually he has one or two, and if he neglects them he is like a man who takes the wrong road where several meet. The further he goes the worse he fares.

of his talents and means.

A man's opportunity usually has some relation to his ability. It is an opening for a man It is an opening for him to use what he has, faithfully and to the utmost. It requires toil, self-denial and faith. If he says: "I want a better opportunity than that; I am worthy of a higher position than it offers; or if he says, "I wont work as hard and economize as closely as that opportunity demands," he may, in after years, see the folly of his pride and indolence.

There are young men all over the land who want to get rich. They want to begin, not at the bottom of the ladder, but half way up. They want somebody to give them a lift, or carry them up in a balloon, so that they can avoid the early and arduous struggles of the majority of those who have been successful. No wonder that such men fail, and then complain of Providence. Grumbling is usually a miserable expedient that people resort to to drown the reproaches of conscience. They know that they have been foolish, but they try to persuade themselves that they have been unfortunate.

THE

The Ode of Age.

HERE is a sweetness in autumnal days,
Which many a lip doth praise;

When the earth, tired a little and grown mute
Of song, and having borne its fruit,
Rests for a little space ere winter come.
It is not sad to turn the face toward home,
Even though it shows the journey nearly done;
It is not sad to mark the westering sun,

Even though
Silence there is, indeed for song,
Twilight for noon;
But for the steadfast soul and strong
Life's autumn is as June;

we know the night doth come.

As June itself, but clearer, calmer far.
Here come no passion gusts to mar,
No thunder clouds or rains to beat
To earth the blossoms and the wheat,
No high tumultuous noise

Of

youth's self-seeking joys,

But a cold radiance white

As the

moon

shining on a frosty night.

To-morrow is as yesterday, scant change,
Little of new or strange,

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Too calm to suffer pain, too loving to forget,
And reaching down a succoring hand
To where the sufferers are,

To lift them to the tranquil heights afar.
Whereon Time's conquerors stand.
And when the precious hours are done,
How sweet at set of sun

To gather up the fair laborious day!
To have struck some blow for right
With tongue or pen;

To have smoothed the path to light
For wandering men;

To have chased some fiend of Ill away;

A little backward to have thrust

The instant powers of Drink and Lust;
To have borne down Giant Despair;
To have dealt a blow at Care!

How sweet to light again the glow

Of warmer fires than youth's, tho' all the blood runs slow!

Oh! is there any joy,

Of all that come to girl or boy

Or manhood's calmer weal and ease,

To vie with these?

Here is some fitting profit day by day,

Which none can render less;

Some glorious gain Fate cannot take away,
Nor Time depress.

Oh, brother, fainting on your road!
Poor sister, whom the righteous shun!

There comes for you, ere life and strength be done,

An arm to bear your load.

A feeble body, maybe bent, and old,
But bearing 'midst the chills of age

A deeper glow than youth's; a nobler rage;

A calm heart, yet not cold.

A man or woman, withered perhaps, or bent,

To whom pursuit of gold or fame

Is as a fire grown cold, an empty name,
Whom thoughts of Love no more allure,
Who in a self-made nunnery dwell,
A cloister calm and pure,

A beatific peace greater than tongue can tell.

And sweet it is to take,

With something of the eager haste of youth
Some fainter glimpse of Truth
For its own sake;

To observe the ways of bee, or plant, or bird;
To trace in Nature the ineffable Word,
Which by the gradual wear of secular time,

Has worked its work sublime;

To have touched, with infinite gropings dim,
Nature's extremest outward rim;

To have found some weed or shell unknown before;
To advance Thought's infinite march a foot pace

more;

To make or to declare laws just and sage;
These are the joys of Age.

Or by the evening hearth, in the old chair,
With children's children at our knees,

So like, yet so unlike the little ones of old-
Some little lad with curls of gold,
Some little maid demurely fair,

To sit, girt round with ease,
And feel how sweet it is to live,
Careless what fate may give;

To think, with gentle yearning mind,

Of dear souls who have crossed the Infinite Sea;

To muse with cheerful hope of what shall be

For those we leave behind

When the night comes which knows no earthly morn;
Yet mingled with the young in hopes and fears,
And bringing from the treasure-house of years,
Some fair-set counsel long-time worn;

To let the riper days of life,
The tumult and the strife,
Go by, and in their stead
Dwell with the living past,
So living, yet so dead.

The mother's kiss upon the sleeper's brow,
The little fish caught from the brook,

The dead child-sister's gentle voice and look,
The school days and the father's parting hand;
The days so far removed, yet oh! so near,

So full of precious memories dear;

The wonder of flying Time, so hard to understand!

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