O'er the distant hills came Cromwell; Bessie sees him, and her brow,

Lately white with fear and anguish, has no anxious traces now.

At his feet she tells her story, shows her hands all bruised and torn;

And her face so sweet and pleading, yet with sorrow pale and worn,

Touched his heart with sudden pity, lit his eyes with misty light:

"Go! your lover lives,” said Cromwell,

"Curfew shall not ring to-night.'

Wide they flung the massive portal; led the prisoner forth to die

All his bright young life before him. 'Neath the darkening English sky

Bessie comes with flying footsteps, eyes aglow with love-light sweet:

Kneeling on the turf beside him, lays his pardon at his feet,

In his brave, strong arms he clasped her, kissed the face upturned and white,

Whispered, "Darling, you have saved me—
Curfew will not ring to-night!"

ROSE HARTWICK THORPE

THE MISER WHO LOST HIS TREASURE.

T'S use that constitutes possession wholly;
I ask those people who've a passion
For heaping gold on gold, and saving solely,
How they excel the poorest man in any fashion?
Diogenes is quite as rich as they.

True misers live like beggars, people say;
The man with hidden treasure Æsop drew
Is an example of the thing I mean.

In the next life he might be happy, true;
But very little joy in this he knew ;
By gold the miser was so little blessed.
Not its possessor, but by it possessed;
He buried it a fathom underground;
His heart was with it; his delight
To ruminate upon it day and night;
A victim to the altar ever bound.

He seemed so poor, yet not one hour forgot
The golden grave, the concentrated spot;
Whether he goes or comes, or eats or drinks,
Of gold, and gold alone, the miser thinks.
At last a ditcher marks his frequent walks,
And muttering talks,

Scents out the place, and clears the whole,
Unseen by any spies.

On one fine day the miser came, his soul
Glowing with joy; he found the empty nest;
Burst into tears, and sobs, and cries,
He frets, and tears his thin gray hair ;
He's lost what he had loved the best.
A startled peasant passing there

Inquires the reason of his sighs.

"My gold! my gold! they've stolen all." "Your treasure? what was it, and where?" "Why, buried underneath this stone." (A moan!)

"Why, man, is this a time of war?

Why should you bring your gold so far?
Had you not better much have let
The wealth lie in a cabinet,

Where you could find it any hour
In your own power?"
"What! every hour? a wise man knows
Gold comes, but slowly, quickly goes;
I never touched it." "Gracious me !".
Replied the other, "why, then, be
So wretched? for if you say true,
You never touched it, plain the case;
Put back that stone upon the place,
'Twill be the very same to you."

THE DEATH OF NAPOLEON.

The fifth of May came amid wind and rain. Napoleon's passing spirit was deliriously engaged in a strife more terrible than the elements around. The words "tete d'armee," (head of the army,) the last which escaped from his lips, intimated that his thoughts were watching the current of a heavy fight. About eleven minutes before six in the evening, Napoleon expired.

ILD was the night, yet a wilder night
Hung round the soldier's pillow;
In his bosom there waged a fiercer fight
Than the fight on the wrathful billow.

A few fond mourners were kneeling by,
The few that his stern heart cherished;
They knew, by his glazed and unearthly eye,
That life had nearly perished.

They knew by his awful and kingly look,

By the order hastily spoken,

That he dreamed of days when the nations shook,
And the nations' hosts were broken.

He dreamed that the Frenchman's sword still slew,
And triumphed the Frenchman's "eagle ;"
And the struggling Austrian fled anew,
Like the hare before the beagle.

The bearded Russian he scourged again,
The Prussian's camp was routed,
And again, on the hills of haughty Spain,
His mighty armies shouted.

Over Egypt's sands, over Alpine snows,
At the pyramids, at the mountain,
Where the wave of the lordly Danube flows,
And by the Italian fountain,

On the snowy cliffs, where mountain-streams
Dash by the Switzer's dwelling,

He led again, in his dying dreams,

His hosts, the broad earth quelling.

Again Marengo's field was won,

And Jena's bloody battle; Again the world was overrun,

Made pale at his cannons' rattle.

He died at the close of that darksome day, A day that shall live in story;

In the rocky land they placed his clay, "And 'eft him alone with his glory."

B

ISAAC MCLEllan.

FAITHLESS NELLY GRAY.

EN BATTLE was a soldier bold,
And used to war's alarms;

But a cannon ball took off his legs,
So he laid down his arms!

Now as they bore him off the field,
Said he, "Let others shoot,
For here I leave my second leg,
And the Forty-second Foot!"
The army-surgeons made him limbs :
Said he "They're only pegs;
But there's as wooden members quite
As represent my legs!"

Now Ben he loved a pretty maid,
Her name was Nelly Gray!
So he went to pay her his devours

When he'd devoured his pay.

But when he called on Nelly Gray,
She made him quite a scoff;
And when she saw his wooden legs,
Began to take them off!

"O Nelly Gray ! O Nelly Gray!
Is this your love so warm?
The love that loves a scarlet coat,
Should be more uniform!"

Said she, "I loved a soldier once,

For he was blithe and brave; But I will never have a man

With both legs in the grave!

Before you had those timber toes,
Your love I did allow,

But then you know, you stand upon
Another footing now!"

"O Nelly Gray ! O Nelly Gray!

For all your cheering speeches,

At duty's call I left my legs
In Badajos's breaches!"

"Why, then," said she, "you've lost the feet

Of legs in war's alarms,

And now you cannot wear your shoes
Upon your feats of arms!"

"O, false and fickle Nelly Gray ;

I know why you refuse :Though I've no feet-some other man Is standing in my shoes!

'I wish I n'er had seen your face; But, now, a long farewell!

For you will be my death :-alas ! You will not be my Nell!"

Now when he went from Nelly Grav, His heart so heavy got

And life was such a burthen grown, It made him take a knot!

So round his melancholy neck
A rope he did entwine,
And, for his second time in life,
Enlisted in the Line!

One end he tied around a beam,
And then removed his pegs,
And, as his legs were off-of course,
He soon was off his legs!

And there he hung till he was dead As any nail in town

For though distress had cut him up, It could not cut him down!

A dozen men sat on his corpse,
To find out why he died-
And they buried Ben in four cross-roads,
With a stake in his inside!

THOMAS HOOD

THE MISER'S WILL.

HIS tale is true, for so the records show;
'Twas in Germany, not many years ago:

Young Erfurth loved. But ere the wedding
day

His dearest friend stole with his bride away,
The woman false that he had deemed so true,
The friend he trusted but an ingrate, too;
What wonder that, his love to hatred grown,
His heart should seem to all mankind a stone?
All kindred ties he broke, himself be banned,
And sought a solitude in stranger land.

Grief finds relief in something found to do,
The mind must find some object to pursue;
And so, ere long, his being was controlled
By sole, debasing, longing greed for gold,
How soon his little multiplied to much!
His hand seemed gifted with a Midas touch;
Yet still he kept himself unto himself,
None seeing but for increase of his peir.

Death came at last; discovering ere he died,
His heart had yet one spot unpetrified;
For, on his bed, his hand upon it still,
There, open, lay the poor old miser's will.

The will was read; there to his brothers three
He left to each a thousand marks; and he,
The friend who caused him all his grief and shame,
Was, with his free forgiveness, left the same;
But none of these, to whom such wealth he gave
Should follow his remains unto the grave
On pain of forfeit. 'Neath his pillow pressed
Was found a letter, sealed; and thus addressed:
"To my dear native city of Berlin."

The brothers heard, and thought it was no sin
To stay away; besides, his absence long
Had quenched the love not ever over-strong.
What did the faithless friend? He knelt in tears,
Looked back in anguish o'er the vanished years,
Saw once again their happy boyhood's time,
Their manhood's friendship, his repented crime.
"Oh, my wronged Erfurth, now in death so cold,
I've your forgiveness, care I for your gold?"
And. at the funeral, striving to atone,

The single mourner there, he walked alone.

The letter, opened at the Mayor's will,

Was found to hold the miser's codicil,
Wherein he gave his hoarded gold and lands

To him that disobeyed the will's commands,

Should such there be-whose heart knew love or pity

Or, failing, all went to his native city.

And so the friend who stole his bride away;
Who turned to night his joyous morn of day,
Humbly repentant, when his victim died,
Received his pardon and his wealth beside.

GEORGE BIrdseye.

THE TALE OF A TRAMP.

ET me sit down a moment;

A stone's got into my shoe.
Don't you commence your cussin'-
I ain't done nothin' to you.
Yes, I'm a tramp-what of it?
Folks say we ain't no good-
Tramps have got to live, I reckon,
Though people don't think we should.
Once I was young and handsome;
Had plenty of cash and clothes-
That was before I got to tipplin',

And gin got in my nose.
Way down in the Lehigh Valley
Me and my people grew ;
I was a blacksmith, Captain,
Yes, and a good one, too.

Me and my wife, and Nellie-
Nellie was just sixteen,
And she was the pootiest cretur
The Valley had ever seen.
Beaux! Why she had a dozen,

Had 'em from near and fur;
But they was mostly farmers-
None of them suited her.
But there was a city chap,

Handsome, young and tall-
Ah! curse him! I wish I had him
To strangle against yonder wall!
He was the man for Nellie-
She didn't know no ill;
Mother, she tried to stop it,

But you know young girls' will.
Well, it's the same old story-

Common enough, you say— But he was a soft-tongued devil, And got her to run away. More than a month, or later,

We heard from the poor young thing¬

He had run away and left her

Without any weddin'-ring!

Back to her home we brought her,
Back to her mother's side;

Filled with a ragin' fever,

She fell at my feet and died!
Frantic with shame and sorrow,
Her mother began to sink,
And died in less than a fortnight;
That's when I took to drink.
Come, give me a glass now, Colonel,

And I'll be on my way,

And I'll tramp till I catch that scoundrel, If it takes till the judgment day.

LITTLE GOLDEN-HAIR.

ITTLE Golden-hair was watching, in the window broad and high,

For the coming of her father, who had gone the foe to fight;

He had left her in the morning, and had told her not to cry,

But to have a kiss all ready when he came to her at night.

She had wandered, all the day,
In her simple childish way,

And had asked, as time went on,
Where her father could have gone.

She had heard the muskets firing, she had counted

every one,

Till the number grew so many that it was too great a load;

While the heavy sand was falling on her mother's coffin-lid;

near by,

All the night a golden streamlet of the moonbeams gently flowed!

she bore,

And thought of him and yearned for him, whatever else she did.

So she wondered all the day

What could make her father stay, And she cried a little too,

As he told her not to do.

And the sun sunk slowly downward and went grandly out of sight,

And she had the kiss all ready on his lips to be bestowed;

But the shadows made one shadow, and the twilight grew to night,

And she looked, and looked, and listened, down the dusty Concord road.

Then the night grew light and lighter, and the moon rose full and round,

In the little sad face peering, looking piteously and mild;

Stiil upon the walks of gravel there was heard no welcome sound,

And no father came there, eager for the kisses of his child.

Long and sadly did she wait,
Listening at the cottage-gate;
Then she felt a quick alarm,

Lest he might have come to harm.

With no bonnet but her tresses, no companion but her fears,

And no guide except the moonbeams that the pathway dimly showed,

With a little sob of sorrow, quick she threw away her tears,

And alone she bravely started down the dusty Concord road.

And for many a mile she struggled, full of weariness and pain,

Calling loudly for her father, that her voice he might not miss ;

Till at last, among a number of the wounded and the slain,

Was the white face of the soldier, waiting for his daughter's kiss.

'AVE you heard of the wonderful one-hoss shay, That was built in such a logical way

It ran a hundred years to a day,

And then, of a sudden, it—Ah, but stay,
I'll tell you what happened, without delay-
Scaring the parson into fits,

Frightening people out of their wits-
Have you ever heard of that, I say?

Seventeen hundred and fifty-five,
Georgius Secundus was then alive—
Snuffy old drone from the German hive.
That was the year when Lisbon town
Saw the earth open and gulp her down,
And Braddock's army was done so brown,
Left without a scalp to its crown.

It was on the terrible earthquake-day
That the deacon finished the one-hoss shay.

Now, in building of chaises, I tell you what,
There is always, somewhere, a weakest spot-
In hub, tire, felloe, in spring or thill,
In panel or crossbar, or floor, or sill,
In screw, bolt, thoroughbrace-lurking still,
Find it somewhere you must and will-
Above or below, or within or without-
And that's the reason, beyond a doubt,
A chaise breaks down, but does'nt wear out.

But the deacon swore-(as deacons do, With an "I dew vum" or an "I tell yeou,")— He would build one shay to beat the taown 'N' the keounty 'n' all the kentry raoun'; It should be so built that it couldn' break daown :— "Fur," said the deacon, "'t's mighty plain

That the weakes' place mus' stan' the strain 'N' the way t' fix it, uz I maintain,

Is only jest

To make that place uz strong uz the rest."

So the deacon inquired of the village folk
Where he could find the strongest oak,
That could n't be split, nor bent, nor broke—

That was for spokes, and floor, and sills;
He sent for lancewood, to make the thills;
The crossbars were ash, from the straightest trees;
The panels of white-wood, that cuts like cheese,
But lasts like iron for things like these;
The hubs from logs from the "Settler's ellum,"
Last of its timber-they couldn't sell 'em-
Never an ax had seen their chips,

And the wedges flew from between their lips,
Their blunt ends frizzled like celery-tips ;
Step and prop-iron, bolt and screw,
Spring, tire, axle, and linchpin too,
Steel of the finest, bright and blue;
Thoroughbrace bison-skin, thick and wide;
Boot, top, dasher, from tough old hide,
Found in the pit where the tanner died.
That was the way he "put her through."
"There!" said the deacon, " naow she'll dew!"

Do! I tell you, I rather guess

She was a wonder, and nothing less!
Colts grew horses, beards turned gray,
Deacon and deaconess dropped away,
Children and grandchildren—where were they?
But there stood the stout old one-hoss shay,
As fresh as on Lisbon-earthquake-day!

Eighteen hundred-it came, and found
The deacon's masterpiece strong and sound.
Eighteen hundred, increased by ten-
"Hahnsum kerridge" they called it then.
Eighteen hundred and twenty came-
Running as usual-much the same.
Thirty and forty at last arrive;
And then came fifty-and fifty-five.
Little of all we value here

Wakes on the morn of its hundreth year
Without both feeling and looking queer.
In fact, there's nothing that keeps its youth,
So far as I know, but a tree and truth.
(This is a moral that runs at large:
Take it. You're welcome.—No extra charge.)

First of November-the earthquake day.—
There are traces of age in the one-hoss shay,
A general flavor of mild decay-
But nothing local, as one may say.
There couldn't be-for the Deacon's art
Had made it so like in every part
That there wasn't a chance for one to start.

For the wheels were just as strong as the thills,
And the floor was just as strong as the sills,
And the panels just as strong as the floor,
And the whipple-tree neither less nor more,
And the back crossbar as strong as the fore,
And spring, and axle, and hub encore.
And yet, as a whole, it is past a doubt
In another hour it will be worn out!

First of November, 'Fifty-five!

This morning the parson takes a drive.
Now, small boys, get out of the way!
Here comes the wonderful one-hoss shay,
Drawn by a rat-tailed, ewe-necked bay.
"Huddup!" said the parson.-Off went they.

The parson was working his Sunday text-
Had got to "fifthly," and stopped perplexed
At what the-Moses--was coming next.
All at once the horse stood still,
Close by the meet'n'-house on the hill.
-First a shiver, and then a thrill,
Then something decidedly like a spill-
And the parson was sitting upon a rock,
At half-past nine by the meet'n'-house clock--
Just the hour of the earthquake shock!

What do you think the parson found,
When he got up and stared around!
The poor old chaise in a heap or mound,
As if it had been to the mill and ground!
You see, of course, if you're not a dunce,
How it went to pieces all at once-
All at once, and nothing first-
Just as bubbles do when they burst.—
End of the wonderful one-hoss shay.
Logic is logic. That's all I say.

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.

THE DRUMMER-BOY'S BURIAL.

LL day long the storm of battle through the startled valley swept ;

All night long the stars in heaven o'er the slain sad vigils kept.

O, the ghastly upturned faces gleaming whitely through. the night!

O, the heaps of mangled corses in that dim sepulchral light!

One by one the pale stars faded, and at length the morning broke,

But not one of all the sleepers on that field of death awoke.

Slowly passed the golden hours of that long bright summer day,

And upon that field of carnage still the dead unburied lay.

Lay there stark and cold, but pleading with a dumb, unceasing prayer,

For a little dust to hide them from the staring sun and air.

But the foeman held possession of the hard-won battleplain,

In unholy wrath denying even burial to our slain.