gentle, and soft, and white,
That on my head like a blessing lay,
And led me a child and guided my youth;
To-night 'tis a dreary thought, in truth,
That those gentle hands are dust.
That I may be blamed, and you not be sad,
That I may be praised, and you not be glad;
'Tis a dreary thought to your boy to-night,
That over your sweet smile, over your brow,
The clay-cold turf is pressing now,
That never again as the twilight falls
You will welcome your boy to the old brown walls
Of the homestead far away.

The homestead is ruined—gone to decay,
But we read of a house not made with hands,
Whose firm foundation forever stands;
And there is a twilight soft and sweet.
Will she not stand with outstretched hands
My homesick eyes to meet—
To welcome her boy as in days before,
To home, and to rest, forevermore?

But the years come and the years go,
And they lay on her grave as they silently pass,
Red summer buds and wreaths of snow,
And springing and fading grass.
And far away in an English town,
In the secluded, tranquil shade
Of an old Cathedral quaint and brown,
Another grave is made—
A small grave, yet so high
It shadowed all the world to me,
And darkened earth and sky.
But only for a time; it passed,
The unreasoning agony,
Like a cloud that drops its rain;
And light shone into our hearts at last.
And patience born of pain.
And now like a breath of healing balm
The sweet thought comes to me,
That my child has reached the Isle of Calm,
Over the silent sea—
That my pure little Blanche is safe in truth,
Safe in immortal beauty and youth.

When she left us in the twilight gloom,
When she left her empty nest,
And the aching hearts below;
Full well, full well I know,
What tender-eyed angel bent
Down for my brown-eyed little bird,
From the shining battlement.
I know with what fond caressing,
And loving smile and word,
And look of tender blessing,
She took her to her breast,
And led her into some quiet room,
In the mansions of the blest.
Oh, mother, beloved, oh, child so dear,
Not by a wish, would I lure you here.

My son is a bright, brave boy, with a grace
Of beauty caught from his mother's face,
And his mother and he in truth are dear,
Full tenderly, and fond, and near
My heart is bound to my wife and child;
But the summer of life is not its May,
And dreams and hopes that our youth beguiled,
Are but pallid forms of clay.

There's the boy's first love and passionate dream,
A face like a morning star, a gleam
Of hair the hue of a robin's wing—
Brown hair aglow with a golden sheen,
And eyes the sweetest that ever were seen.

Mary, we have been parted long,
You were proud, and we both were wrong,
But 'tis over and past, no living gleam
Can come again to the dear, dead dream.
It is dead, so let it lie,
But nothing, nothing can ever be
Like that old dream to you or to me.

I think we shall know, shall know at last,
All that was strange in all the past,
Shall one day know, and shall haply see
That the sorrows and ills, that with tears and sighs,
We vainly endeavored to flee,
Were angels who, veiled in sorrow's guise
Came to us only to bless.
Maybe we shall kneel and kiss their feet,
With grateful tears, when we shall meet
Their unveiled faces, pure and sweet,
Their eyes' deep tenderness.
We shall know, perchance, had these angels come
Like mendicants unto a kingly gate
When we sat in joy's royal state,
We had barred them from our home.
But when in our doorway one appears
Clothed in the purple of sorrow's power,
He will enter in, no prayers or tears
Avail us in that hour.
So what we call our pains and losses
We may not always count aright,
The rough bars of our heavy crosses
May change to living light.

GLORIA THE TRUE.

Gayly a knight set forth against the foe,
For a fair face had shone on him in dreams;
A voice had stirred the silence of his sleep,
"Go win the battle, and I will be thine."

So, for the love of those appealing eyes,
Led by low accents of fair Gloria's voice,
He wound the bugle down his castle's steep,
And gayly rode to battle in the morn.

And none were braver in the tented field,
Like lightning heralding the doomful bolt;
The enemy beheld his snowy plume,
And death-lights flashed along his glancing spear.

But in the lonesome watches of the night,
An angel came and warned him with clear voice,
Against high God his rash right arm was raised,
Was rashly raised against the true, the right.

He strove to drown the angel voice with song
And merry laughter with his princely peers;
But still the angel bade him with clear voice,
"Go join the ranks you rashly have opposed."

"Oh, Angel!" cried he, "they are few and weak,
They may not stand before the press of knights;"
But still the angel bade him with clear voice,
"Go help the weak against the mighty wrong."

At last the words sunk deep within his heart,
With god-like courage cried he out at last,
"Oh, Gloria, beautiful, I can lose thee,
Lose life and thee, to battle for the right."

And when he joined the brave and stalwart ranks,
Like Saul amid his brethren he stood,
Braver and seemlier than all his peers,
And nobly did he battle for the right.

Gentlest unto the weak, and in the fray,
So dauntless, none—no fear of man had he;
He wrought dismay in Error's blackened ranks
So nobly did he battle for the right.

But at the last he lay on a lost field;
Couched on a broken spear, he pallid lay;
With dying lips he murmured Gloria's name,
"The field is lost, and thou art lost to me."

When lo! she stood beside him, pure and fair,
With tender eyes that blessed him as he lay;
And lo! she knelt and clasped his dying hands,
And murmured, "I am thine, am thine at last."

With wondering eyes, he moaned, "All—all is lost,
And I am dying." "Ah, not so," she cried,
"Nothing is lost to him who dare be true;
Who gives his life shall find it evermore."

"Methought I saw the spears beat down like grain,
And the ranks reel before the press of knights;
The level ground ran gory with our wounds;
Methought the field was lost, and then I fell."

"Be calm," she cried, "the right is never lost,
Though spear, and shield, and cross may shattered be,
Out of their dust shall spring avenging blades
That yet shall rid us of some giant wrong.

"And all the blood that falls in righteous cause,
Each crimson drop shall nourish snowy flowers
And quicken golden grain, bright sheaves of good,
That under happier skies shall yet be reaped.

"When right opposes wrong, shall evil win?
Nay, never—but the year of God is long,
And you are weary, rest ye now in peace,
For so He giveth His beloved sleep."

He smiled, and murmured low, "I am content,"
With blissful tears that hid the battle's loss;
So,