Yet, on her rocks, and on her sands, And wintry hills, the school-house stands,

And what her rugged soil denies,
The harvest of the mind supplies.

The riches of the Commonwealth Are free, strong minds, and hearts of health;

And more to her than gold or grain, The cunning hand and cultured brain.

For well she keeps her ancient stock. The stubborn strength of Pilgrim Rock; And still maintains, with milder laws, And clearer light, the Good Old Cause!

Nor heeds the sceptic's puny hands, While near her school the church-spire stands;

Nor fears the blinded bigot's rule, While near her church-spire stands the school.

ALL'S WELL.

THE clouds, which rise with thunder, slake

Our thirsty souls with rain; The blow most dreaded falls to break From off our limbs a chain; And wrongs of man to man but make The love of God more plain. As through the shadowy lens of even The eye looks farthest into heaven On gleams of star and depths of blue The glaring sunshine never knew!

SEED-TIME AND HARVEST.

As o'er his furrowed fields which lie
Beneath a coldly dropping sky,
Yet chill with winter's melted snow,
The husbandman goes forth to sow,

Thus, Freedom, on the bitter blast
The ventures of thy seed we cast,
And trust to warmer sun and rain
To swell the germ, and fill the grain.

Who calls thy glorious service hard?
Who deems it not its own reward?
Who, for its trials, counts it less
A cause of praise and thankfulness?

It may not be our lot to wield
The sickle in the ripened field;
Nor ours to hear, on summer eves,
The reaper's song among the sheaves.

Yet where our duty's task is wrought
In unison with God's great thought,
The near and future blend in one,
And whatsoe'er is willed, is done!

And ours the grateful service whence
Comes, day by day, the recompense:
The hope, the trust, the purpose stayed,
The fountain and the noonday shade.
And were this life the utmost span,
The only end and aim of man,
Better the toil of fields like these
Than waking dream and slothful ease.

But life, though falling like our grain,
Like that revives and springs again;
And, early called, how blest are they
Who wait in heaven their harvest-day!

The flowers, and leaves, and painted butterflies,

The deer's branched antlers, the gay bird that flings

The tropic sunshine from its golden wings,

The brightness of the human counte

nance,

Its play of smiles, the magic of a glance, Forevermore repeat,

In varied tones and sweet, That beauty, in and of itself, is good.

O kind and generous friend, o'er
whom

The sunset hues of Time are cast,
Painting, upon the overpast
And scattered clouds of noonday

sorrow

The promise of a fairer morrow, An earnest of the better life to come; The binding of the spirit broken, The warning to the erring spoken, The comfort of the sad, The eye to see, the hand to cull Of common things the beautiful, The absent heart made glad By simple gift or graceful token Of love it needs as daily food, All own one Source, and all are good!

Hence, tracking sunny cove and reach,

Where spent waves glimmer up the beach,

And toss their gifts of weed and shell

From foamy curve and combing swell,

No unbefitting task was thine

To weave these flowers so soft and fair

In unison with His design

Who loveth beauty everywhere;
And makes in every zone and clime,
In ocean and in upper air,
"All things beautiful in their time."

185

air

The crane-flock leaves, no trace of passage there,

He gives the weary eye The palm-leaf shadow for the hot noon hours,

And on its branches dry
Calls out the acacia's flowers;
And where the dark shaft pierces
down

Beneath the mountain roots,
Seen by the miner's lamp alone,
The star-like crystal shoots;

So, where, the winds and waves
below,

The coral-branchéd gardens grow,
His climbing weeds and mosses
show,

Like foliage, on each stony bough,
Of varied hues more strangely gay
Than forest leaves in autumn's
day; -

Thus evermore,

On sky, and wave, and shore, An all-pervading beauty seems to