Beautiful snow! Beautiful snow!

Up at the dawning,
In the cold morning,

Children exult, though the winds fiercely blow;
Hailing the snowflakes

Falling as day breaks

Joyful they welcome the beautiful snow.

Beautiful snow! Beautiful snow!
Childhood's quick glances
See the bright fancies

Decking the window-panes softly and slow;
Forest and city,

Figure so pretty,

Left by the magical fingers of snow.

Beautiful snow! Beautiful snow!
Atmosphere chilling,
Carriage-wheels stilling,

Warming the cold earth, and kindling the glow
Of Christian pity
For the great city

Of wretched creatures who starve 'mid the snow.

Beautiful snow! Beautiful snow!

Fierce winds blowing,
Thickly 't is snowing;

Night gathers round us - how warm then the glow Of the fire so bright,

On the cold winter night,

As we draw in the curtains to shut out the snow.

Beautiful snow! Beautiful snow!

Round the bright fireside,

In the long eventide,

Closely we gather though keen the winds blow;
Safely defended,

Kindly befriended,

Pity the homeless exposed to the cold, icy snow.

MAJOR SIGOURNEY.

BEAUTIFUL SNOW.

OH the snow, the beautiful snow,
Filling the sky and the earth below!
Over the house-tops, over the street,
Over the heads of the people you meet,

Dancing,
Flirting,

Skimming along.

Beautiful snow! it can do no wrong.

372

メ

Flying to kiss a fair lady's cheek;
Clinging to lips in a frolicsome freak.
Beautiful snow, from the heavens above,
Pure as an angel and fickle as love..

Oh the snow, the beautiful snow!
How the flakes gather and laugh as they go!
Whirling about in its maddening fun,
It plays in its glee with every one.

Chasing,
Laughing,
Hurrying by,

It lights up the face and it sparkles the eye;
And even the dogs with a bark and a bound
Snap at the crystals that eddy around.
The town is alive and its heart in a glow,
To welcome the coming of beautiful snow.

How the wild crowd goes swaying along,
Hailing each other with humor and song!
How the gay sledges like meteors flash by, -
Bright for a moment, then lost to the eye i
Ringing,
Swinging,

Dashing, they go

Over the crest of the beautiful snow;

Snow so pure when it falls from the sky,

-

To be trampled in mud by the crowd rushing by;
To be trampled and tracked by the thousands of feet,
Till it blends with the horrible filth of the street.

(Once I was pure as the snow,

- but I fell ;

to hell;

Fell, like the snow-flakes, from heaven
Fell to be tramped as the filth of the street;
Fell to be scoffed, to be spit on, and beat.

Pleading,
Cursing,

Dreading to die,

Selling my soul to whoever would buy,

Dealing in shame for a morsel of bread,

Hating the living and fearing the dead.

Merciful God! have I fallen so low?

And yet I was once like the beautiful snow!

Once I was fair as the beautiful snow,

With an eye like its crystals, a heart like its glow;

Once I was loved for my innocent grace,

--

Flattered and sought for the charm of my face.

Father,
Mother,

Sisters all,

God, and myself, I have lost by my fall.

The veriest wretch that goes shivering by
Will take a wide sweep, lest I wander too nigh;
For of all that is on or about me, I know,

There is nothing that 's pure but the beautiful snow.

How strange it should be that this beautiful snow
Should fall on a sinner with nowhere to go!

How strange it would be, when the night comes again,
If the snow and the ice struck my desperate brain!

Fainting,
Freezing,
Dying alone,

Too wicked for prayer, too weak for my moan
To be heard in the crash of the crazy town,
Gone mad in its joy at the snow's coming down;
To lie and to die in my terrible woe,

With a bed and a shroud of beautiful snow!

Helpless and frail as the trampled-on snow,
Sinner, despair not - Christ stoopeth low
To rescue the soul that is lost in its sin,
And raise it to life and enjoyment again.
Groaning,
Bleeding,

Dying for thee,

The Crucified hung on the accursed tree.

His accents of mercy fall soft on my ear;

Is there mercy for me, will he heed my weak prayer?
O God, in the stream that for sinners doth flow,

Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.

JAMES W. WATSON.

2

$524

SISTER MADELEINE.

THE blessed hush of eventide
Over the weary city fell,

And softly pealed the vesper-bell
Across the waters dim and wide,
Breathing a sacred spell.

Across the waters wide and dim,

And through the dusty, murky street,
The chimes passed on, with silver feet:
Chords of the never-silent hymn
With which the air doth beat.

They pulsed across the silent space
Which closed the old cathedral in,
And rang remotely through the din
That still was in the market-place,
With echo faint and thin.

One of the bustling, careless throng
Listened apart, with low-bowed head;
A toiler, he, for daily bread, -
What time had such to heed the song?
Why works he not instead?

A far-off look is in his eyes,
He seeth nothing that is near,
He only doth those bell-tones hear,
Soft ringing through the purple skies,
Distant, but ever dear.

Oh, happy magic of their chime!
The dreams of youth again enfold
That time-worn spirit, growing old
Too early in this alien clime,

Where hearts as snow are cold.

But fairest of the treasures sweet

By memory brought from their dim place,
Shineth the vision of a face

For angel habitations meet
In its transcendent grace.

He saw her as she used to stand,
With parted lips and lifted eyes,
Watching the wondrous sunset skies,
And pointing, with her slender hand,
Towards their changeful dyes.

Ah, what can give the world release
From under thraldom of this pain,
That life can never know again
The rapturous joy, the trust and peace
Of youth's departed train?

But not of this he thought to-night:
The happy days of long ago

Were round him, with unfaded glow;
The flowers as fresh, the skies as bright,
As those he used to know.

More deep and dark the shadows grew,
The bell's last echoes died away
Within the heavens still and gray.
The peace of night seemed sweet and new
After the toilful day.

But lo! a sudden, blinding glare
Shot upward in the northern sky;
And loud and sharp rang out a cry
That human seemed in its despair, -
The bells of Trinity,

Which but a few short hours ago
Breathed their good-night so tenderly
Over the quiet earth and sea,
And faded with the sunset glow
Peaceful exceedingly.

But now across the night they ring
With a wild terror and despair

That thrills through all the fearful air,
Till the wide heavens seem shuddering
With the impassioned prayer.

And human hearts have heard the call:
Thousands are thronging up the steep
Whereon the gray old tower doth keep
Its steadfast vigil over all

Within its shade asleep.

Too late, too late the help had come,
The flames were curling everywhere,
And, fainting in the scorching air,
The very bells at last were dumb
In uttermost despair.

But in the silence that succeeds
The sudden hushing of the bells,
One awful human cry upswells,
And not a listening heart but bleeds
For her whose fate it tells.

"Alas, 't is Sister Madeleine!"

The nuns cry out, with faces pale,

And then they wring their hands, and wail; For sweeter sister ne'er was seen

Beneath a convent veil.

But while the thousands held their breath,
One listener sprang with footstep light,
Pushing the crowd to left and right,
Forcing his way to fiery death,

While every cheek grew white.

He vanished through the smoke-veiled door,
And higher yet, with fearful glee,
The red flames clambered merrily,
Wrapping the lofty tower o'er
With splendor sad to see.

The abbess knelt, with ashen face

"For those two souls we cry to Thee, Through Him who died upon the tree, That Thou wilt grant to them thy grace In their extremity."