AN IDEAL WITH A ROMAN NOSE. Seraphina, young and lovely, with a fortune at command, For she loved a bright ideal, with a haughty Roman nose. In her waking dreams she saw him-tall, with raven locks above, While beneath his brow majestic curved the nose that she could love And all other men grew hateful, and with longing look she cried, "Come! a life's devotion waits thee! come and claim thy willing bride!" Love, with soft entreating accents, sought in vain the maid en's heart; Eyes sent out their killing glances, manly figures did their part, All in vain; her virgin fancy by the nose was captive led, And to each who came a-wooing, "No!" was all the maiden said. Sternest fate brought retribution. At a brilliant ball,one night, Seraphina met her hero-that loved nose beamed on her sight. Colonel Montague Augustus (name as high-bred as his looks), What a pity truth must spoil it by that vile cognomen, Snooks! Tall, with raven locks, and whiskers, and-most potent charm of all— Roman nose, whose grand proportions held her very soul in thrall. Well, the story needs no telling: each seemed to the other drawn, Talking, walking, glancing, dancing, soon the blissful hours had gone. Colonel Montague Augustus, in the graceful role of lover, Seraphina gazing fondly at the nose that towered above her. Meeting upon meeting followed! luckless lovers one by one, Saw the fortress of her fancy yield ere siege was well begun. Ere the winter snows had vanished, ere the blossoming of spring, At her side his nose was carried, on her finger shone his ring. 'Mid the disappointed suitors who for Seraphina pined, One rash youth to schemes of vengeance had devoted heart and mind. "Words are useless," so he answered to the friends who would advise "Words are useless while my rival flaunts that nose before my eyes!" And he hastened from their presence with such anguish in his air That he filled them with forebodings dark and deep as his despair. That same evening Seraphina and her charming Montague, Tired of crowds and gay confusion, stole an hour to bill and coo; Side by side, their hands close-clasping, he then: "Dearest, name the day." She, enraptured, softly sighing, "Who that knows thee could say nay?" In that moment, hark! a footstep, then a hand flung wide the door Seraphina's cast-off-suitor gazes on her face once more. "Mr. Simpkins!" cries the maiden; "unexpected pleasure this; Colonel Snooks—so glad to see you” (though she didn't look her bliss), Simpkins answered not her greeting. Onward with a single stride, Past the chair she would have offered, he had reached the Colonel's side. Something strange in his demeanor thrilled poor Seraphina's heart With a sense of coming evil, but in vain her scream and start. "Seraphina, I have lost you," Simpkins mutters, as he stands; "Well I know what came between us"-wildly clenching both his hands. "But if I might wreak my vengeance on the cause of all my woe, Pull that nose once; then, contented, I could from your pres ence go." Quick as thought his hand is lifted-he has grasped that lovely nose See! he starts! he pales! he trembles! see his nerveless grasp unclose! While poor Montague Augustus, groaning, sinks into a chair, With too little nose to speak of, and a face of white despair. But the crumbling waxen fragments, as from Simpkins' hand they fell, And were scattered o'er the carpet, had their own sad tale to tell. 66 Seraphina's scream of terror died in anguish sore away; Where's your nose?" she questioned, faintly, then in deadly swoon she lay; For the fearful truth had smote her, as she caught the Colonel's eye He had lost his nose in battle; she had loved a waxen lie! EVENING BRINGS US HOME. Upon the hills the wind is sharp and cold, Among the mists we stumbled, and the rocks The sharp thorns prick us, and our tender feet We have been wounded by the hunter's darts; The darkness gathers. Through the gloom no star The clouds are round us, and the snow-drifts thicken. THE NEW PREACHER.-PHILIP J. BULL. Twas Sunday after conference, and word had got around That our new pastor, Brother Green, had come upon the ground; You see he rode up in the stage with Miss Miranda Sloan, And for transmittin' news they say she beats the telephone. That day the sky was swept quite clear of every cloud that floats; It looked as though 'twould cut a host of army over-coats; The sun, above the hemlock hills, its burnished chariot rolled, And shone as bright at half-past ten as California gold. And then at night the stars shone out like fragments of the day, As if some passing queen had dropped her jewels in the way; And so to both the services the folks turned out for miles; They filled the pews and overflowed the benches in the aisles. I don't just now remember where the preacher took his text: My memory will not hold a thing from one hour to the next; But it was somewhere in the Psalms-about a man in "tears" A-seeding down a field of his to reap in after years. He said that if we chose to sow our fields with amber wheat, We'd pretty certain get a crop to thresh, and grind, and eat; But they that scatter thistle-down, he said would surely find Their finger-tips a-bleedin' when they come to rake and bind. The second sermon that he preached-I found the text for wife Was, "Be thou faithful unto death, and get a crown of life," Such good instructions to the church, and there was one at least Who thought the richest wine was kept to close the Sabbath feast. He passed us oratory's flowers tied up with logic's twine, Though such bouquets will seldom stick in button-holes like mine; A little illustration, though, he put in for a pin, And so the whole discourse, you see, was firmly fastened in. 'Twas a little drummer lad who played the royal strains; The Irish took him prisoner on Gorey's bloody plains; They told him he should drum for them; he shook his head and smiled, While loud and clear, like clarion notes, spoke out the captive child: "The drum that played 'God save the King' shall ne'er for rebels beat!" And then he leaped upon its head and burst it with his feet, When flashing spears proclaimed, alas! that death had surely come, And there that hero poured his blood upon the broken drum. There wasn't a dry eye in the house; the women sobbed aloud; And like a passing hurricane the Spirit swept the crowd; "Nearer, my God, to Thee!" was sung, as only saints can sing, And many pledged in solemn vows allegiance to our king. But like the sun, which scientists declare, while growing old, Throws off its heat so rapidly that sometime 'twill be cold ; Some loved the last year's preacher so, that when they were bereft, They really didn't seem to have a spark of kindness left. And so they brought their critics' shears to cut out some mistake; The clip, clip of those instruments just made my old heart ache: For scores of pastors, now beneath the graveyard's moss and stones, Are there because before they died the vultures picked their bones. And there were Brother Jones's folks-well, there! I've spoke the name; The way they eat new preachers up is just a burning shame; come, And pay my quart'rage right up prompt, and make them feel at home. The spokes in the itinerant wheel are mostly good and true, Although some seem to be well worn and others nearly new; But what a happy time we'd have, if all the praying folks Would urge the chariot on so fast they couldn't see the spokes! COWS-A COMPOSITION. This is how the pupil put it: "The cow is a good animal. She has two horns and two eyes, and gives milk which is good to drink. She has four legs, and eats grass and hay. Some of them are red, and they have long tails." This is how the head teacher says it ought to be put: "The female of the bovine genus is a beneficent mammal; this ruminant quadruped is possessed of corneous protuberances projecting from the occiput; her vision is binocular, and she yields an edible and nutritious lacteal exudation; she is quadrupedal and herbivorous, assimilating her food in both the succulent and exsiccated state; some of them chromatically correspond to the seventh coior of the spectrum, and they are endowed with caudal appendages of exaggerated longitudinality." |