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Besides, we had our higher loves, - fair science ruled my heart,

We dreamed together of the days, the dreambright days to come,

We were strictly confidential, and we called each other "chum."

And many a day we wandered together o'er the hills,

I seeking bugs and butterflies, and she, the ruined mills

And rustic bridges, and the like, that picturemakers prize

To run in with their waterfalls, and groves, and summer skies.

And many a quiet evening, in hours of silent

ease,

We floated down the river, or strolled beneath the trees,

And talked, in long gradation from the poets to the weather,

While the western skies and my cigar burned slowly out together.

Yet through it all no whispered word, no telltale glance or sigh,

Told aught of warmer sentiment than friendly sympathy.

We talked of love as coolly as we talked of nebulæ,

And thought no more of being one than we did of being three.

"Well, good by, chum!" I took her hand, for the time had come to go.

And she said her young affections were all wound My going meant our parting, when to meet, we up in art.

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High friendship, such as ours, might well such childish arts despise ;

did not know.

I had lingered long, and said farewell with a very heavy heart;

For although we were but friends, 't is hard for honest friends to part.

"Good-by, old fellow! don't forget your friends beyond the sea,

And some day, when you've lots of time, drop a line or two to me."

The words came lightly, gayly, but a great sob, just behind,

Welled upward with a story of quite a different kind.

We liked each other, that was all, quite all there And then she raised her eyes to mine, - great

was to say,

liquid eyes of blue,

So we just shook hands upon it, in a business Filled to the brim, and running o'er, like violet

sort of way.

We shared our secrets and our joys, together hoped and feared,

With common purpose sought the goal that young Ambition reared;

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"O, never," said she, "could I think of en- Consists not in the multitude of friends,

shrining

But in the worth and choice. Cynthia's Revels.

COWPER.

BEN JONSON.

An image whose looks are so joyless and dim ;
But yon little god upon roses reclining,
We'll make, if you please, sir, a Friendship of Burns with one love, with one resentment glows.
A generous friendship no cold medium knows,

him."

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So the bargain was struck; with the little god Statesman, yet friend to truth! of soul sincere, laden,

She joyfully flew to her home in the grove. "Farewell," said the sculptor, "you 're not the first maiden

In action faithful, and in honor clear;
Who broke no promise, served no private end,
Who gained no title, and who lost no friend.

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Who came but for Friendship, and took away Like the stained web that whitens in the sun,

Love!"

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Whose flattering leaves, that shadowed us in Our prosperity, with the least gust drop off In the autumn of adversity.

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Give me the avowed, the erect, the manly foe, Bold I can meet, - perhaps may turn his blow; But of all plagues, good Heaven, thy wrath can send,

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And do as adversaries do in law,

HOMER.

SHENSTONE.

Save, save, oh! save me from the Candid Friend! Strive mightily, but eat and drink as friends.

New Morality.

GEORGE CANNING.

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And hurt my brother.

Hamlet, Act v. Sc. 2.

SHAKESPEARE.

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Lay this into your breast:

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COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION.

WHEN IN THE CHRONICLE OF WASTED | How could he see to do them? having made one,

TIME.

SONNET CVI.

WHEN in the chronicle of wasted time
I see descriptions of the fairest wights,
And beauty making beautiful old rhyme,
In praise of ladies dead, and lovely knights;
Then, in the blazon of sweet beauty's best
Of hand, of foot, of lip, of eye, of brow,
I see their antique pen would have expressed
Even such a beauty as you master now.
So all their praises are but prophecies
Of this our time, all you prefiguring;
And, for they looked but with divining eyes,
They had not skill enough your worth to sing;
For we, which now behold these present days,
Have eyes to wonder, but lack tongues to
praise.

SHAKESPEARE.

O MISTRESS MINE.

FROM "TWELFTH NIGHT," ACT II. SC. 3.

O MISTRESS mine, where are you roaming?
O, stay and hear! your true-love 's coming
That can sing both high and low;
Trip no further, pretty sweeting,
Journeys end in lovers' meeting,

Every wise man's son doth know.

What is love? 't is not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure:
In delay there lies no plenty,
Then come kiss me, Sweet-and-twenty,
Youth's a stuff will not endure.

SHAKESPEARE.

PORTIA'S PICTURE.

FROM "THE MERCHANT OF VENICE," ACT III. SC. 2.

FAIR Portia's counterfeit ? What demi-god
Hath come so near creation? Move these eyes?
Or whether, riding on the balls of mine,
Seem they in motion? Here are severed lips,
Parted with sugar breath; so sweet a bar

Should sunder such sweet friends: Here in her hairs

The painter plays the spider; and hath woven A golden mesh to entrap the hearts of men, Faster than gnats in cobwebs: But her eyes,

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TO MISTRESS MARGARET HUSSEY.
MERRY Margaret,

As midsummer flower,
Gentle as falcon,

Or hawk of the tower;
With solace and gladness,
Much mirth and no madness,
All good and no badness;
So joyously,
So maidenly,
So womanly
Her demeaning,
In everything
Far, far passing
That I can indite,
Or suffice to write,
Of merry Margaret,
As midsummer flower,
Gentle as falcon
Or hawk of the tower;
As patient and as still,
And as full of good-will,
As fair Isiphil,
Coliander,
Sweet Pomander,
Good Cassander;
Stedfast of thought,
Well made, well wrougr..;
Far may be sought
Ere you can find
So courteous, so kind,
As merry Margaret,
This midsummer flower,
Gentle as falcon,

Or hawk of the tower.

JOHN SKELTON.

THE FORWARD VIOLET THUS DID

I CHIDE.

SONNET XCIX.

THE forward violet thus did I chide :·

Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells,

If not from my love's breath? the purple pride
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells,
In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dyed.
The lily I condemned for thy hand,
And buds of marjoram had stolen thy hair:
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand,
One blushing shame, another white despair;
A third, nor red nor white, had stolen of both,
And to this robbery had annexed thy breath;
But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth
A vengeful canker eat him up to death.

More flowers I noted, yet I none could see,
But sweet or color it had stolen from thee.
SHAKESPEARE.

THERE IS A GARDEN IN HER FACE. FROM "AN HOURE'S RECREATION IN MUSICKE," 1606.

THERE is a garden in her face,

Where roses and white lilies blow; A heavenly paradise is that place,

Wherein all pleasant fruits do grow ; There cherries grow that none may buy, Till cherry-ripe themselves do cry.

Those cherries fairly do enclose

Of orient pearl a double row, Which when her lovely laughter shows, They look like rosebuds filled with snow; Yet them no peer nor prince may buy, Till cherry-ripe themselves do cry.

Her eyes like angels watch them still,

Her brows like bended bows do stand,
Threatening with piercing frowns to kill
All that approach with eye or hand
These sacred cherries to come nigh,
Till cherry-ripe themselves do cry.

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RICHARD ALLISON.

MY SWEET SWEETING.

FROM A MS. TEMP. HENRY VIII,

Ан, my sweet sweeting;
My little pretty sweeting,

My sweeting will I love wherever I go ;
She is so proper and pure,
Full, steadfast, stable, and demure,

There is none such, you may be sure,
As my sweet sweeting.

GIVE PLACE, YE LOVERS.

GIVE place, ye lovers, here before

That spent your boasts and brags in vain ; My lady's beauty passeth more

The best of yours, I dare well sayen,
Than doth the sun the candle-light,
Or brightest day the darkest night.

And thereto hath a troth as just

As had Penelope the fair;
For what she saith, ye may it trust,
As it by writing sealed were:

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