Foot-prints, that perhaps another, Let us, then, be np and doing,
Sailing o'er Life's solemn main,

With a heart for any fute;
A forioru and shipwreck d brotuer, Still achievjug, still pursuing,
Seting, shall take heart aguin.

Learn to lavour and to wait.

The Ladder of St. Augustine. Saint Angustine! well hast thou said, We have not wings, we cannot soar; That of our vices we can fraine

But we have feet to scale and climb Aladder, if we will but tread

By slow degrees by more and inore, Beneath our feet.each deed of sbame ! The cloudy summits of our time. All common things, each day's events, The mighty pyramids of stone

That with the hour begiu and end, That wedge-like cleave the desert ains, Our pleasures and our díscoutents, When pearer seen and better known,

Are rounds by which we muy uscend. Are but gigantic flights of stairs. The low desire, the base design,

The distant mountuins that uprear That makes another's virtues less; Their solid bastions to the skies, The revel of the treachervus wine, Are crossed by pathways. that appear And all occasions of excess;

As we to biguier levels rise. The longing for ignoble things;

The heights by great men reached and The strife for triumph more than kept truth;

Were not attained by sudden flight, The hardening of the heart that brings But they, while their companions slept,

Irieverence for the dreams of youth; Were toiling upward in the night. All thoughts of ill; all evil deeds.

Standing on what too long we bore That have their root in thoughts of With shoulders bent, and downcast

eyes. Whatever hidders or impedes

We may discern-unseen before The action of the nobler will:

A path to higher destinies. All these must first be trampled down Nor deem the irrevocable Past

Beneath our feet, if we would gain As who!ly wasted, wholly vain, In the bright fields of fair renown

If, rising on its wrecks, at last The right of eminent domain.

To something nobler we attain.

God 8-Acre.
I like that ancient Saxon phrase, which calls

The burial-ground God's-Acre! It is just;
It consecrates each grave within its walls.

And breathes a beuison o'er the sleeping dust.
God's-Acre! Yes, that blessed name imparts

Comfort to those who in the grave have sown
The seed that they had garnered in their hearts,

Their bread of life; alas! no more their own.
Into its furrows shall we all be cast,

In the sure faith that we shall rise again
At the great harvest, when the archangel's blast

Shall winuow, like a fan, the chaff and ruin.
Then shall the good stand in immortal bloom,

In the fair gardens of that second birth;
And each bright blossom mingle its perfume

With that of flowers which never bloomed on earth.
With thy rnde plonghshare. Death. turn up the sod,

And spread the furrow for the seed we sow;
This is the field and Acre of our God.

This is the place where human harvests grow!

jil;

8

Autumn in America.
With what a glory comes and goes the year!
The buds of spring, those beautiful barbingers
Of sunny skies and cloudless times, enjoy
Life's newness, and earth's garniture spread out,
And when the silver habit of the clouds
Comes down upon the autumn fun, and with
A sober gladness the old year tukes up
His brigat inheritance of golden fruits,
A pomp an'i pageant fill the splendid scene.

There is a beautiful fpirit breathing DOW
Its mellow richness on ihe clustered trees,
Avd, from a beaker full of richest dyes,
Pouring new glory on the autumn woods,
And dipping in warm light the pillowed clouds.
Mor ou the mountain, like a summer bird,
Lifts up her purple wing; and in the vales
The gentle wind a sweet and passion: te wooer,
Kisees the blushing leaf, and stirs up life
Within the solemu woods of ash deep-criineoned,
And silver beech, and maple yellow-leared,
Where Autumn, like a faint old man. Bits down
By the wayside awenry Through the trees
The golden robin moves The purple finch,
Tbat on wild cherry ind red cedar feeds,
A winter bird comes with its plaintive whistle,
And pecks by the witch-hazel; whilst aloud
From cottage roofs the warbling blue-b.id sings;
And merrily, with oft repeated stroke,
Sounds from the threshing-floor the busy flail,

Oh, what a glory doth this world pnt on
For him who with a fervent heart goes forth,
Uuder the bright a.d glorious sky. and looks
On duties well performed. and days well spint!
For him the wind, ay, and the yellow leaves,
Shall have a voice, and give him eloquent teachings;
He shull so hear the so emp hymn, that Death
Has lifted up for all, that he shall go
To his long resting-place without å tear

A Rainy Day.
A cold, uninterrupted rain.

Full late they plept. They did not hear That washed each southern window. The challenge of Sir Chanticleer. pane,

Who on the empty threshing-floor, And made a river of the road :

Disdainful of the rain outeide. A sen of mist that overflowed

Was strutting with a martial stride, The house, the barne, the gilded vane, As if upon his thigh he trore And drowned the upland and the plain. The famous broadsword of the Sqnire, Through which the oak-trees, broad and And suid. * Behold me. and admire!' high.

Only the Poet seemed to hear Like phantom ships went drifting hy; In drowse or errem more near 'and near Aud liiddı:n behind a watery screen,

Across the border-'nnd of sleep The eun upseen. or only seen

The blowing of a l'itheroine horn, As a faint pallor in the sky

That langhed the dismal dav to scorn ; Thus cold and colourleee and gray, A splasli of hoofs and rush of wheels The morn of that antampal day,

Through sand and mire like stranding As if reluctant to begin,

keels. Dawped on the silent Sndbory Inn,

As from the road with eudden gweep, And all the guests that in it lay.

The mail drove up the little steep,

.

And stopped beside the tavern door; Plunged forward through the sea of fog,
A moment stopped, and then again, And all wus silent as before-
With crack of wbip and bark of dog, Ali silent suve the drippivg rain.

CHARLES SWAIN. A native of Manchester, and carrying on business there as an engraver, CHARLES SWAIN (1803–1874) became known as a poet in the pages of the Literary Gazette' and other literary journals. His collected works are : Metrical Essays,' 1827 ; "The Mind and other Poems,' 1831 ; Dramatic Chapters, Poems, and Songs,' 1847 ; English Melodies,' 1849; Art and Fashion,' 1863: and · Songs and Ballads,' 1868. Some of Mr. Swain's songs and domestic poemswhich are free from all mysticism and exaggerated sentiment-have been very popular both at home and abroad. They have great sweetness, tenderness, and melody.

The Death of the Warrior King. There are noble beads bowed down and I hen seemed the bard to cope with Time, pale,

And triumph o'er his doomDeep sounds of woe arise,

Another world in freshness burst And tears flow fast around the couch Oblivion's mighty tomb ! Where a wounded warrior lies;

Again the hardy Britone rushed The hue of death is gathering dark

Like lions to the fight. Upon his lofty brow,

While horse and foot-helm, shield, and And the arm of might and valour Lalls,

lance, Weak as an infant's wow.

Swept by his visioned sight!
I saw him 'mid the battling hosts, But battle shout and waying plume,
Like a bright and leading star,

The drum's heart-stirring beat, Where banner, belm, and falchion gleam- The glittering pomp of prosperous war, ed,

The rush of inillion feet, And few the bolts of war.

The magic of the minstrel's song, When, in his plenitude of power,

Which told of victories o'er, He trod the Holy Land,

Are sights and sounds the dying king I saw the routed Saracens

Shall see-sball bear no more! Flee from his blood-dark brand,

It was the hour of deep midnight, I saw him in the banquet hour

In the dim and quiet sky, Forsake the festive throng,

When, with sable cloak and 'broidered To seek his favourite minstrel's baunt,

pall, And give his soul to song:

A funeral train swept by; For dearly as he loved renown,

Dull and sad fell the torches glare
He loved that spell-wrought strain

Ou many a stately crest-
Which bade the brave of perished days They bore tbe noble warrior king
Light Couquest's torch again.

To his last dark home of rest.
! SYDNEY DOBELL-ALEXANDER SMITH-GERALD MASSEY.

Under the pseudonym of Sydney Vendys,' SYDNEY DOBELL (1824–1874) published several elaborate poetical works.

He was born at Craubrook, Kent, in 1824, but spent the greater part of his youth in the neighbourhood of Cheltenham, where his father was engaged in business as a wine-merchant. In his intervals of leisure the young poet --whose regular employment was in his father's counting-house--contrived to write a dramatic poem, 'The Roman,' published in 1850. In 1854 appeared . Walder, Part the First;' in 1855, Sonnets on the

War, written in conjunction with Mr. A. Smith ; and in 1856, • England in Time of War. A man of cultivated intellectual tastes and benevolence of character, Mr. Dobell seems to have taken up some false or exaggerated theories of poetry and philosophy, and to have wasted fine thoughts and conceptions on uncongenial themes. The great error of sone of our recent poets is the want of simplicity and nature. They heap up images and sentiments, the ornaments of poetry, without aiming at order, consistency, and the natural development of passion or feeling. We have tims many beautiful and fanciful ideas, but few complete or correct poems. Part of this defect is no doubt to be attributed to the youth of the poets, for taste and judgment come slowly even where genius is abundant, but part also is due to neglect of the old masters of song. In Mr. Dobell's first poem, however, are some passages of finished blank verse:

The Italian Brothers.

I had a brother:
We were twin shoots from one dead stem. He grew
Nearer the sun, and ripened into beauty;
And I, within the shadow of iny thoughts,
Pined at his side and loved him. He was brave,
Gallant and free. I was the silent slave
Of fancies; neither laughed, nor fought, nor played,
And loved not morn nor eve for very tren.bling
At their long wandering shades. In childhood's sports
He wor for me, and I looked on aloof;
And when perchance I heard hisn called my brother,
Was proud and happy. So we grew together,
Within our dwelling by the desert plain,
Where the roe leaped,
And from his icy hills the frequent wolf
Gave chivalry to slaughter. Here and there
Rude heaps, that had been cities, clad the ground
With history. And far and wear, where grass
Was greenest, and the unconscious goat browsed free,
The teeming soil was sown with desolations,
As though Time--striding o'er the field be reaped
Warmed with the spoil, rích droppings for the gleaners
Threw round his harvest way. Frieze, pedestal,
Pillars that bore through years the weight of glory,
And take their rest. Tombs, arches, monuments,
Vainly set up to save a name, as thongh
The eternal saved the perishable; nrne,
Which winds bad emptied of their dust, but left
Full of their immortality. In shroude
Of reverent leaves, rich works of wondrous beauty
Lay sleeping-like the Children in the Wood-
Fairer than they.
T'he Ruins of Ancient Rome.

Upstood
The boar unconscious walls, biason and bare,
Like an old man deaf, blind, and gray, in whom
The years of old stand in the sun and murmur
Of childhood and the dead. From parapeta

Where the sky regts, from broken niches-each
More than Olympus-for gods dwelt in them-
Below from senatorial hannts and seats
Imperial. where the ever-passing futes
Wore out the stone, strange hermit birds croaked forth
Sorrowful sounds, like watchers on the beight
Crying the hours of rnin. When the clouds
Dress. d every myrtle on the walls in mourning,
With calm prerogative the eternal pile
Impassive shone with the unearthly light
of immortality When conquering suns
Triumphed in jubilant earth, it stood ont dark
With thoughts of ages : like some mighty captive
Upon his death-bed in a Christian land,
And lying, through the chant of psalm and creed,
Unshriven and stern, with peace upon his brow,
And on his lips strange gods.

Rank weeds and grasses,
Carelers and nodding, grew, and usked no leave,
Where Romans trembled Where the wreck was saddest,
Sweet pensive herbs that had been gny elsewhere,
With conscious mien of place rore tall and still,
And hent with luty Like some village children
Who found a dead king on a battie-field,
And with decorous care and reverent pity
Composed the lordly ruin. and sat down
Grave without tears. At length the giant lay,
And everywhere he was begirt with years.
And everywhere the torn and mouldering Past
Hung with the ivy. For Time, emit with honour
Of what he slew, cast his own mantle on him,

That wone should mock the dead. In .1871 Mr. Dobell published a spirited political lyric, entitled • England's Day.'

The day has gone by when the public of this country could be justly charged with reglect of native genius. Any inanifestation of original intellectual power bursting from obscurity is instantly recognised, fostered, and applauded. The ever-open periodical press is ready to welcome and proclaim the new comer, and there is no lack of critics animated by a tolerant and generous spirit. In 1853 appeared 'Poems' by ALEXANDER SMITH (1830-1867), the principal piece in the collection being a series of thirteen dramatic scenes, entitled 'A Life Drama.' The manuscript of this volume had been submitted to the Rev. George Gilfillan, and portions of it had been laid before the public by that enthusiastic critic, accompanied with a strong recommendation of the young author as a genuine poet of a high order. Mr. Smith (born in Kilmarnock) had been employed as a designer of patterns in one of the Glasgow factories, but the publication of his poems marked him out for higher things, and he was elected to the office of Secretary to the Edinburgh University. Thus placed in a situation favourable for the cultivation of his talents, Mr. Smith continu d his literary pursuits. He joined with Mr. Dobell, as already sta in writing a series of War Sonnets; be tributed prose essuys to some of the periodicals; and in 1857 he came

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