Fade, faue, O world, with thy tangled web,
With its changing, mocking shadows spread!
If I toiled and toiled till my life should ebb,
I could not unravel its tangled thread.
Press close to my heart, O cool green grasses!
Steal over my senses, O wild-wood flower!
Let tender words of the breeze that passes,
Soothe my tired spirit to rest for an hour.

TIME.

Pause for a while, O Time, in thy flight,
Ere thou climbest the wearisome height
Of the future, and lighten the years
Of their heavy burden of unshed tears.
What matter it though a few years pass,
And golden sands lie still in thy glass;
What though thou failest to leave a trace
Of age on many a fair young face;

Or failest to weave with silver threads
The crown of hair on beautiful heads?
"Twould lift from many a life the cloud
That folds it now like a clinging shroud,
To many a heart that has now grown old,
The beautiful story of love be told.

I would I might woo thee into a sleep,
Sleep so unconscious, unbroken, and deep,
Thy glass might gather a century's dust;
The gleaming sickle be dulled with rust.
The dusky folds of thy robe to grasp,
I strive; but powerless my hands unclasp.

Though in wild despair I pray thee stay,
Relentlessly thou dost glide away.
And on, and on, in thy steady flight,
Pausing never by day or night.

Sowing broadcast-as they sow the grain,
Thorns and roses, pleasure and pain.

Some gather the roses for their part; Some bury the thorns deep in their heart, But onward it must forever be,

'Tis vain to repine, 'tis God's decree.

William L. Burdick.

NIAGARA.

Niagara, deep, thrilling voice of God,

Majestic in thy glory and thy might,

Thou art the first of Nature's masterworks.

The tempest's thunder 'mid the fierce storm's roar, The surge of billows beating on the shore,

Wild crash of landslides from the mountain hoar,

All yield to thee in power grand, sublime.

Yet with thy grandeur beauty is arrayed.

Through richest tints of heaven, dawn's bright gold,
The sunset's crimson gleams, fair Luna's sheen,
The water's misty foam and living green,
With never-dying rainbows for thy crown;
Thy voice, in ceaseless monotone divine,
Chants the paean of vast Infinity.

SUNSET.

The mountains bathed in glory are,

At the coming of day's rest,
Golden and crimson from afar,
The clouds part o'er their crest,
In vistas beautiful and bright,
As if from heaven waft down,
The rosy hues of the infant night,
Now give to the day its crown.