"And there we hunted the walrus,

The narwhale, and the seal;
Ha! 'twas a noble game!
And like the lightning's flame
Flew our harpoons of steel.

"There were six of us altogether,
Norsemen of Helgoland;

In two days and no more
We killed of them threescore,
And dragged them to the strand!"
Here Alfred, the Truth-Teller,
Suddenly closed his book,
And lifted his blue eyes,
With doubt and strange surmise
Depicted in their look.

And Othere, the old sea-captain,

Stared at him wild and weird, Then smiled, till his shining teeth Gleamed white from underneath

His tawny, quivering beard.

And to the King of the Saxons,
In witness of the truth,

Raising his noble head,

He stretched his brown hand, and said, "Behold this walrus-tooth!"

COME to me, O ye children!
For I hear you at your play,
And the questions that perplexed me
Have vanished quite away.

Ye open the eastern windows,
That look towards the sun,
Where thoughts are singing swallows,
And the brooks of morning run.

In your hearts are the birds and the sunshine,

In your thoughts the brooklet's flow; But in mine is the wind of Autumn,

And the first fall of the snow.

Ah! what would the world be to us,
If the children were no more?
We should dread the desert behind us
Worse than the dark before.

What the leaves are to the forest,
With light and air for food,
Ere their sweet and tender juices

Have been hardened into wood,-
That to the world are children ;

Through them it feels the glow Of a brighter and sunnier climate

Than reaches the trunks below.

Come to me, O ye children!

And whisper in my ear

What the birds and the winds are singing

In your sunny atmosphere.
For what are all our contrivings,
And the wisdom of our books,
When compared with your caresses,
And the gladness of your looks?

Ye are better than all the ballads
That ever were sung or said;
For ye are living poems,

And all the rest are dead.

MY LOST YOUTH.

OFTEN I think of the beautiful town
That is seated by the sea;
Often in thought go up and down
The pleasant streets of that dear old
town,

And my youth comes back to me. And a verse of a Lapland song Is haunting my memory still : "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I can see the shadowy lines of its trees,
And catch, in sudden gleams,
The sheen of the far-surrounding seas,
And islands that were the Hesperides
Of all my boyish dreams.

And the burden of that old song, It murmurs and whispers still : "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the black wharves and the

slips,

And the sea-tides tossing free; And Spanish sailors with bearded lips, And the beauty and mystery of the ships, And the magic of the sea.

And the voice of that wayward song Is singing and saying still: "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the bulwarks by the shore,
And the fort upon the hill;
The sunrise gun, with its hollow roar,
The drum-beat repeated o'er and o'er,
And the bugle wild and shrill.

And the music of that old song Throbs in my memory still : "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

*

I remember the sea-fight far away,'
How it thundered o'er the tide!
And the dead captains, as they lay
In their graves, o'erlooking the tranquil
bay,

Where they in battle died.

And the sound of that mournful song Goes through me with a thrill: "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I can see the breezy dome of groves, The shadows of Deering's Woods : And the friendships old and the early loves Come back with a sabbath sound, as of doves

In quiet neighbourhoods.

And the verse of that sweet old song, It flutters and murmurs still : "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

I remember the gleams and glooms that dart

Across the schoolboy's brain; The song and the silence in the heart, That in part are prophecies, and in part Are longings wild and vain.

And the voice of that fitful song Sings on, and is never still: "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

*This was the engagement between the Enterprise and Boxer, off the harbour of Portland, in which both captains were slain. They were buried side by side, in the cemetery on Mountjoy.

There are things of which I may not

speak;

There are dreams that cannot die! There are thoughts that make the strong heart weak,

And bring a pallor into the cheek,
And a mist before the eye.

And the words of that fatal song Come over me like a chill: "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

Strange to me now are the forms I meet
When I visit the dear old town;
But the native air is pure and sweet,
And the trees that o'ershadow each
well-known street,

As they balance up and down,

Are singing the beautiful song, Are sighing and whispering still: "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

And Deering's Woods are fresh and fair,
And with joy that is almost pain
My heart goes back to wander there,
And among the dreams of the days that

were

I find my lost youth again.

And the strange and beautiful song, The groves are repeating it still: "A boy's will is the wind's will, And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts."

SANTA FILOMENA.* WHENE'ER a noble deed is wrought, Whene'er is spoken a noble thought, Our hearts in glad surprise, To higher revels rise.

*"At Pisa the church of San Francisco contains a chapel dedicated lately to Santa Filomena; over the altar is a picture, by Sabatelli, representing the Saint as a beautiful, nymphlike figure, floating down from heaven, attended by two angels, bearing the lily, palm,

The tidal wave of deeper souls
Into our inmost being rolls,

And lifts us unawares

Out of all meaner cares.

Honour to those whose words or deeds
Thus help us in our daily needs,
And by their overflow

Raise us from what is low!

Thus thought I, as by night I read
Of the great army of the dead,

The trenches cold and damp,
The starved and frozen camp,-
The wounded from the battle-plain,
In dreary hospitals of pain,

The cheerless corridors,
The cold and stony floors.

Lo! in that house of misery
A lady with a lamp I see

Pass through the glimmering gloom,
And flit from room to room.

And slow, as in a dream of bliss,
The speechless sufferer turns to kiss
Her shadow, as it falls
Upon the darkening walls.

As if a door in heaven should be
Opened and then closed suddenly,

The vision came and went,
The light shone and was spent.

On England's annals, through the long
Hereafter of her speech and song,

That light its rays shall cast
From portals of the past.

A Lady with a Lamp shall stand
In the great history of the land,
A noble type of good,
Heroic womanhood.

Nor even shall be wanting here
The palm, the lily, and the spear,
The symbols that of yore
Saint Filomena bore.

and javelin, and beneath, in the foreground, the sick and maimed, who are healed by her intercession."-MRS. JAMESON, Sacred and Legendary Art, ii. 298.

SANDALPHON.

HAVE you read in the Talmud of old, In the Legends the Rabbins have told

Of the limitless realms of the air,Have you read it, the marvellous story Of Sandalphon, the Angel of Glory, Sandalphon, the Angel of Prayer? How, erect, at the outermost gates Of the City Celestial he waits,

With his feet on the ladder of light, That, crowded with angels unnumbered, By Jacob was seen, as he slumbered Alone in the desert at night?

The Angels of Wind and of Fire
Chant only one hymn, and expire

With the song's irresistible stress :
Expire in their rapture and wonder,
As harp-strings are broken asunder

By music they throb to express. But serene in the rapturous throng, Unmoved by the rush of the song,

With eyes unimpassioned and slow, Among the dead angels, the deathless Sandalphon stands listening breathless

To sounds that ascend from below;—

From the spirits on earth that adore, From the souls that entreat and implore

In the fervour and passion of prayer; From the hearts that are broken with losses,

And weary with dragging the crosses

Too heavy for mortals to bear.

And he gathers the prayers as he stands, And they change into flowers in his hands,

Into garlands of purple and red; And beneath the great arch of the portal, Through the streets of the City Immortal Is wafted the fragrance they shed.

It is but a legend, I know,
A fable, a phantom, a show,

Of the ancient Rabbinical lore;
Yet the old mediæval tradition,
The beautiful, strange superstition,

But haunts me and holds me the more.