Year after year, as sure as birds' returning,
Or field-flowers' blossoming above the wintry

mould;

Year after year, in work, or mirth, or mourning, Love we with love's own youth, that never can grow old.

Sweetheart and ladye-love, queen of boyish passion, Strong hope of manhood, content of age begun ; Loved in a hundred ways, each in a different fashion,

Yet loved supremely, solely, as we never love but one.

Dearest and bonniest! though blanched those curling tresses,

Though loose clings the wedding-ring to that thin hand of thine,—

Brightest of all eyes the eye that love expresses! Sweetest of all lips the lips long since kissed mine!

So let the world go round with all its sighs and sinning,

Its mad shout o'er fancied bliss, its howl o'er pleasures past:

That which it calls love's end to us was love's beginning:

I clasp my arms about thy neck and love thee to the last.

AUTHOR OF "JOHN HALIFAX,
GENTLEMAN."

Thirty Years. (Macmillan.)

That it is a good Custom, as well as an old--
Our custom of Dunmow-you needn't be told,—
A prize matrimonial - claim it we may -
Nell and I have been married a Year and a Day.
With all the conditions we've duly complied-
And our love and fidelity well have been tried;
Kneeling down at the Church-door, we dare to
confess

That not e'en in thought, did we ever transgress.

No woman, save Nell, has attractions for me;
And as I feel, I needn't assure you, feels she:
No man in the world, be he ever so big,
Can say Nelly cares for his nonsense a fig.
I'm a pattern to husbands, as she is to wives,—-
We teach all transgressors to alter their lives.
We show how much better it is to be true,
Than each other neglect, as some married folks do.
In short, we're as happy as couple can be,-
No long curtain lectures sweet Nell reads to me;
By no silly squabbles are we ever put out,
Nor do I ever scold, nor does she ever pout.

As to wishing that we were unmarried again,—
A notion so stupid ne'er enter'd our brain :-
Far rather, we give you our honour, -we would
Be married twice over again, if we could!

Three times did I marry the FLITCH to obtain—
Three times unsuccessful-the fourth time I gain :
Blest with Nelly, sweet Nelly, they can't say me
nay,

We've not had a wrong word for a Year and a
Day!

WILLIAM HARRISON AINSWORTH.
Ballads. (Routledge.)

A YEAR AND A DAY.

A YEAR and a Day is the period named When, according to Custom, the FLITCH may be claimed ;

Provided the parties can swear and can prove, They have lived the whole time in true conjugal

love.

'Tis a very old Custom of ours at Dunmow,Fitzwalter established it ages ago:

Its antiquity, sure, can be doubted by no man, Since 'tis mentioned by Chaucer, and trusty Piers Plowman.

AH! thou art no more thine own.
Mine, mine, O love! Tears gather 'neath my lids,-
Sorrowful tears for thy lost liberty,
Because it was so sweet. Thy liberty,

That yet, O love, thou would'st not have again.
No; all is right. But who can give, or bless,
Or take a blessing, but there comes withal
Some pain?

JEAN INGELOW.
Poems; Second Series. (Longmans.)

For whom the precious, homely hearth would serve as well?

There, with the early breaking morn

Ere quite the day is born,

The lustral waters flow serene,

And each again grows clean

From sleep, as from a tomb,

Born to another dawn of joy, and hope, and doom.

There through the sweet and toilsome day
To labour is to pray;

There love with kindly beaming eyes
Prepares the sacrifice;

And voice and innocent smile

Of childhood do our cheerful liturgies beguile.

There, at his chaste and frugal feast,
Love sitteth as a Priest;

And with mild eyes and mien sedate,
His deacons stand and wait;

And round the holy table

Paten and chalice range in order serviceable.

'Twixt birth and death, from sorrow free,

And that, O lady of my rhyme!

I passed with thee.

MORTIMER COLLINS.

Frances.

TO HIS WIFE,

On the Anniversary of her Wedding-day, which was also her Birthday, with a ring.

"THEE, Mary, with this ring I wed "-
So, fourteen years ago, I said.—-
Behold another ring!" For what ?”
"To wed thee o'er again ?"-Why not?

With that first ring I married youth,
Grace, beauty, innocence, and truth;
Taste long admired, sense long revered,
And all my Molly then appeared.
If she, by merit since disclosed,
Prove twice the woman I supposed,

I plead that double merit now,
To justify a double vow.

Here then to-day, with faith as sure,
With ardour as intense, as pure,
As when, amidst the rites divine,

I took thy troth, and plighted mine,
To thee, sweet girl, my second ring
A token and a pledge I bring:
With this I wed, till death us part,
Thy riper virtues to my heart;

Those virtues which, before untried,
The wife has added to the bride:
Those virtues, whose progressive claim,
Endearing wedlock's very name,
My soul enjoys, my song approves,
For conscience' sake, as well as love's.

And why? They show me every hour, Honour's high thought, Affection's power, Discretion's deed, sound Judgment's sentence, And teach me all things-but repentance. SAMUEL BISHOP.

WEDDED LOVERS.

FRIEND, Counsellor, companion, wife, Cherished for Love, in this, and after, life: Reflective, prudent, wise, and sweetly kind: A generous heart, a liberal hand and mind:

Giving a ready help to each who needs : Though to her "household " first, as wise and just ; Yielding with grace, and not because she must: While she, of greater troubles, takes her share, She treats the lesser as the garden weeds, To be removed, and yet with gentle care, That flowers as well are not uprooted there. Thus Love endures through all a chequered life, In calm, in sunshine, or when tempest-tost: THE HUSBAND FOUND, A LOVER IS NOT LOST, THE SWEETHEART STILL REMAINS A SWEETHEART WIFE!

S. C. HALL. Rhymes in Council. (Griffith and Farran.)

SONG.

I LOOK into the eyes I love,

And watch the old love beaming, And call from out the buried years The old, old lover's dreaming. Just here and there one line of grey Divides the raven tresses,

I sigh-Youth fades apace-I smile, The love that blest, still blesses!

SEBASTIAN EVANS.

Brother Fabian's Manuscript. (Macmillan.)

AFTER MARRIAGE.

AND then I slept, and all day dreamed of her,
And waked, and lo! my dream beside me lay:
As one who prays, and rising trancedly,
Sees the fulfilment of his holy prayer
Glimmering before him in the mystic air.

I heard in sleep her soft lips move and sigh, Murmuring in dreams some last night's memory, And once, in love, she clasped her own long hair. There, like some soul that lieth near to death, Waiting the opening of its native skies,

I lay, and watched her death-like fluttering breath,
Waiting the opening of her living eyes.
O deep deep eyes, wherein all glad things dwell,
Thou art my sea, and I thy murmuring shell!
S. K. COWAN.
The Murmur of the Shells. (McCaw, Belfast.)

THE WORN WEDDING-RING.

YOUR wedding-ring wears thin, dear wife; ah, summers not a few,

Since I put it on your finger first, have pass'd o'er me and you;

And, love, what changes we have seen-what cares and pleasures, too—

Since you became my own dear wife, when this old ring was new.

O, blessings on that happy day, the happiest of my life,

When, thanks to God, your low, sweet "Yes"

made you my loving wife;

Your heart will say the same, I know; that day's as dear to you,—

That day that made me yours, dear wife, when this old ring was new.

How well do I remember now your young sweet face that day;

How fair you were-how dear you were—my tongue could hardly say;

Nor how I doated on you; ah, how proud I was

of you;

But did I love you more than now, when this old ring was new?

And O, when death shall come at last to bid me to my rest,

But did I know your heart as well when this old ring was new?

O partner of my gladness, wife, what care, what grief is there,

For me you would not bravely face, with me you would not share?

O what a weary want had every day, if wanting you, Wanting the love that God made mine when this old ring was new!

Years bring fresh links to bind us, wife, young voices that are here,

Young faces round our fire that make their mother's

yet more dear,

Young, loving hearts, your care each day makes yet more like to you,

More like the loving heart made mine when this old ring was new.

And, bless'd be God! all He has given are with us yet; around

Our table, every little life lent to us still is found; Though cares we've known, with hopeful hearts the worst we've struggled through;

Bless'd be His name for all His love since this old ring was new.

The past is dear; its sweetness still our memories treasure yet;

The griefs we've borne, together borne, we would not now forget;

Whatever, wife, the future brings, heart unto heart

still true,

We'll share as we have shared all else since this

old ring was new.

And if God spare us 'mongst our sons and daughters to grow old,

We know His goodness will not let your heart or mine grow cold;

Your aged eyes will see in mine all they've still shown to you,

sight of you,

Of those fond eyes-fond as they were when this old ring was new.

W. C. BENNETT. Baby May, &c. (K. Paul.)

LOVE WRECKED IN CALM WATER.
ALAS-how light a cause may move
Dissension between hearts that love!
Hearts that the world in vain has tried,
And sorrow but more closely tied;

That stood the storm, when waves were rough,
Yet in a sunny hour fall off,

Like ships that have gone down at sea,
When Heav'n was all tranquillity!
A something, light as air-a look,

A word unkind or wrongly taken-
Oh! love, that tempests never shook,

A breath, a touch like this has shaken.
And ruder words will soon rush in
To spread the breach that words begin;
And eyes forget the gentle ray
They wore in courtship's smiling day;
And voices lose the tone that shed
A tenderness round all they said;
Till fast declining, one by one,
The sweetnesses of love are gone,
And hearts, so lately mingled, seem
Like broken clouds,- or like the stream,
That smiling left the mountain's brow,

As though its waters ne'er could sever,
Yet, ere it reach the plain below,
Breaks into floods, that part for ever.

THOMAS MOORE.
Lalla Rookh; The Light of the Haram.

THE SUMMIT.

old ring was new.

Nor read in Sibyl's book.

The blue bends o'er us; good are night and day;
Some blissful influence of the starry seven
Thrilled us ere youth took wing; wherefore essay
The vain assault on heaven?

And what great word Life's singing lips pronounce,
And what intends the sealing kiss of Death,
It skills us not; yet we accept, renounce,
And draw this steadfast breath.

Enough one thing we know; haply anon

All truths, yet no truth better or more clear Than that your hand holds my hand. Therefore on !

The downward pathway, dear!

EDWARD DOWDEN.

SOMETHING WANTING.

PERCHANCE 'twas the fault of the life that they led ; Perchance 'twas the fault of the novels they read; Perchance 'twas a fault in themselves; I am bound not

To say this I know-that these two creatures found not

In each other some sign they expected to find Of a something unnamed in the heart or the mind;

And, missing it, each felt a right to complain

Of a sadness which each found no word to explain.

Whatever it was, the world noticed not it

In the light-hearted beauty, the light-hearted wit. Still, as once with the actors in Greece, 'tis the case,

Each must speak to the crowd with a mask on his face.

Praise follow'd Matilda wherever she went.

She was flatter'd. Can flattery purchase content ? Yes. While to its voice, for a moment she

listen'd,

The young cheek still bloom'd, and the soft eye still glisten'd;

And her lord, when, like one of those light vivid things

That glide down the gauzes of summer with wings Of rapturous radiance, unconscious she moved Through that buzz of inferior creatures, which proved

Her beauty, their envy, one moment forgot 'Mid the many charms there, the one charm that

was not:

And when o'er her beauty enraptured he bow'd, (As they turned to each other, each flush'd from the crowd),

And murmur'd those praises which yet seem'd more dear

Than the praises of others had grown to her ear, She, too, ceased awhile her own fate to regret : "Yes! . . . he loves me," she sigh'd; "this is love, then-and yet!"

Ah, that yet! fatal word! 'tis the moral of all Thought and felt, seen or done, in this world since

the Fall!

It stands at the end of each sentence we learn ;
It flits in the vista of all we discern;
It leads us, for ever and ever, away
To find in to-morrow what flies with to-day.
'Twas this same little fatal and mystical word
That now, like a mirage, led my lady and lord
To the waters of Ems from the waters of Marah ;
Drooping pilgrims in Fashion's blank, arid Sahara !
OWEN MEREDITH.

Lucile. (Chapman and Hall.)

TO HIS WIFE.

OH! hadst thou never shared my fate,
More dark that fate would prove,

My heart were truly desolate
Without thy soothing love.

But thou hast suffered for my sake,
Whilst this relief I found,
Like fearless lips that strive to take
The poison from a wound.

My fond affection thou hast seen,
Then judge of my regret,

To think more happy thou hadst been
If we had never met!

And has that thought been shared by thee?
Ah, no! that smiling cheek
Proves more unchanging love for me
Than laboured words could speak.