nothing more strongly than in an inveterate dislike of interrup tion. The thing which we are doing, we wish to be permitted to do. We have neither much knowledge nor devices; but there are fewer in the place to which we hasten. We are not willingly put out of our way, even at a game of ninepins.

3. While youth was, we had vast reversions in time future; we are reduced to a present pittance, and obliged to economize in that article. We bleed away our moments now as hardly as our ducats. We can not bear to have our thin wardrobe eaten and fretted into by moths. We are willing to barter our good time with a friend, who gives us in exchange his own. Herein is the distinction between the genuine guest and the visitant. This latter takes your good time, and gives you his bad in exchange. The guest is domestic to you as your good cat, or household bird; the visitant is your fly, that flaps in at your window, and out again, leaving nothing but a sense of disturbance, and victuals spoiled.

4. The inferior functions of life begin to move heavily. We can not concoct our food with interruption. Our chief meal, to be nutritive, must be solitary. With difficulty we can eat before a guest; and never understood what the relish of public feasting meant. Meats have no savor, nor digestion fair play, in a crowd. The unexpected coming in of a visitant stops the machine. There is a punctual generation who time their calls to the precise commencement of your dinner-hour-not to eat-but to see you eat. Our knife and fork drop instinctively, and we feel that we have swallowed our latest morsel.

5. Others again show their genius, as we have said, in knocking the moment you have just sat down to a book. They have a peculiar compassionate sneer, with which they "hope that they do not interrupt your studies." Though they flutter off the next moment, to carry their impertinences to the nearest student that they can call their friend, the tone of the book is spoiled; we shut the leaves, and with Dante's lovers, read no more that day. It were well if the effect of the intrusion were simply coëxtensive with its presence, but it mars all the good hours afterwards. These scratches in.

appearance leave an orifice that closes not hastily. "It is a prostitution of the bravery of friendship," says worthy Bishop Taylor, "to spend it upon impertinent people, who are, it may be, loads to their families, but can never ease my loads." This is the secret of their gaddings, their visits, and morning calls. They too have homes, which are-no homes.

XII. THE RETURN OF THE DEAD.

EDNA DEAN PROCTOR.

1. Low hung the moon, the wind was still,
As lone I climbed the midnight hill,
And passed the ruined garden o'er,
And gained the barred and silent door,
Sad welcomed by the lingering rose
That, startled, shed its waning snows.

2. The bolt flew back with sudden clang:
I entered; wall and rafter rang;

Down dropped the moon, and, clear and high,
September's wind went wailing by ;
"Alas!" I sighed, "the love and glow
That lit this mansion long ago!"

3. And groping up the threshold stair,
And past the chambers cold and bare,
I sought the room where glad of yore
We sat the blazing fire before,
And heard the tales a father told,
Till glow was gone, and evening old.

4. Where were those rosy children three?
The boy beneath the moaning sea;
Sweet Margaret, down where violets hide,
Slept, tranquil, by that father's side;
And I, alone, a pilgrim still,
Was left to climb the midnight hill.

5. My hand was on the latch, when lo!
'Twas lifted from within! I know

I was not wild, and could I dream?
Within I saw the wood-fire gleam,
And smiling, waiting, beckoning there,
My father, in his ancient chair!

6. Oh, the long rapture, perfect rest,

As close he clasped me to his breast!
Put back the braids the wind had blown,
Said I had like my mother grown,
And bade me tell him, frank as she,
All the lone years had brought to me.

7. Then by his side, his hand in mine,
I tasted joy serene, divine,

And saw my griefs unfolding fair
As flowers in June's enchanted air.
So warm his words, so soft his sighs,
Such tender lovelight in his eyes.

8. "O Death!" I cried, "if these be thine,
For me the asphodels entwine;
Fold me within thy perfect calm;
Leave on my lips thy kiss of balm ;
And let me slumber, pillowed low,
With Margaret where the violets blow."

9. And still we talked. O'er cloudy bars Orion bore his pomp of stars;

Within, the wood-fire fainter glowed;
Weird on the wall the shadows showed;
Till, in the east, a pallor born
Told midnight melting into morn.

10. Then nearer to his side I drew,
When lo! the cock, remorsely, crew!
A glance, a sigh-we did not speak-
Fond kisses on my brow and cheek,
A sudden sense of rapture flown,
And in the dawn I sat alone!

11. 'Tis true his rest this many a year
Has made the village church-yard dear ;
"Tis true his stone is graven fair,
"Here lies, remote from mortal care;"
I can not tell how both may be,
But well I know he talked with me.

12. And oft, when other fires are low,
I sit within that midnight glow—
My head upon his shoulder leant,
His tender glances downward bent,
And win the dream to sweet delay
Till stars and shadows yield to day.

XIII. THERE'S BUT ONE PAIR OF STOCKINGS TO MEND TO-NIGHT.

ANONYMOUS.

1. An old wife sat by her bright fireside,
Swaying thoughtfully to and fro,

In an ancient chair whose creaky frame
Told a tale of long ago;

While down by her side, on the kitchen floor,
Stood a basket of worsted balls-a score.

2 The good man dozed o'er the latest news,
Till the light of his pipe went out,
And, unheeded, the kitten, with cunning paws,
Rolled and tangled the balls about;

Yet still sat the wife in the ancient chair,
Swaying to and fro in the fire-light glare.

3. But anon a misty tear-drop came
In her eye of faded blue,

Then trickled down in a furrow deep,
Like a single drop of dew;

So deep was the channel-so silent the stream—
The good man saw naught but the dimmed eye-beam.

4. Yet he marveled much that the cheerful light
Of her eye had weary grown,

And marveled he more at the tangled balls;
So he said in a gentle tone,

"I have shared thy joys since our marriage vow,
Conceal not from me thy sorrows now."

5. Then she spoke of the time when the basket there Was filled to the very brim,

And how there remained of the goodly pile

But a single pair-for him.

"Then wonder not at the dimmed eye-light, There's but one pair of stockings to mend to-night.

6. "I can not but think of the busy feet,
Whose wrappings were wont to lie

In the basket, awaiting the needle's time,-
Now wandered so far away;

How the sprightly steps, to a mother dear,
Unheeded fell on the careless ear.

7. "For each empty nook in the basket old,
By the hearth there's a vacant seat;
And I miss the shadows from off the wall,
And the patter of many feet;

'Tis for this that a tear gathered over my sight
At the one pair of stockings to mend to-night.

8. ""Twas said that far through the forest wild
And over the mountains bold,

Was a land whose rivers and darkening caves
Were gemmed with the rarest gold;

Then my first-born turned from the oaken door,
And I knew the shadows were only four.

9. Another went forth on the foaming waves
And diminished the basket's store-

But his feet grew cold-so weary and cold-
They'll never be warm any more—

And this nook, in its emptiness, seemeth to me
To give forth no voice but the moan of the sea.