More precious to her faithful heart,
Was a patchwork quilt that used to be
Our dear old grandma's diary.

She would stand, I remember, beside the bed,
With her wrinkled hand on my little head,
And tell me patiently o'er and o'er,
Though I'd heard it many a time before,
How "This dress came from a famous town,"
And that was "a piece of her wedding gown."

"This blue is one our Mabel wore,
As playing round the farmhouse door,
Or roaming about the homestead lot,
Father called her Forget-me-not."

Ah, no! not forgotten; she ne'er can be,
Though the baby died when only three.

All the treasures of infant grace,
The small plump hands and dimpled face,
The eyes of brown, the curls of gold,
The winsome ways so manifold,—

I knew them all: and she to me

Was just as real as real could be,

"This gray is a piece of your mother's dress, -
Our precious little daughter Bess; .
She was just sixteen when she had that,
With a scarlet feather for her hat,
And a gray fur tippet, warm and good;

The squirrels were shot in the old north wood.

Your father's folks moved here that year,
And bought their farm of old man Vere;
He saw your mother at the meeting-house,
Where she, as meek as a little mouse,
Sat by father's side through sermon time,
And their cheeks would glow and their eyes
would shine.

Your father? Oh, rough enough with boys,
And fond of rollicking fun and noise;

But the tone of his voice grew hushed and

sweet

At the sound of the little woman's feet; And 'twas wonderful how he sobered down At the sight of our Bessie's soft gray gown."

FROM the west the golden sunlight
Softly falls on you and me;
See the twilight shadows falling,
Falling, deepening, silently.
Lassie - come and pour the tea!

Pausing shyly on the threshold,

Half afraid that I shall see,
Now you glance across the table,
Laughing, ah, so merrily,

As I watch you pour the tea.
Now the cream, and now the sugar,
Simpler task could hardly be;
Yet I love to see you, lassie,

Blushing, dimpling, merrily,
While you slowly pour the tea

Lay your hand in mine, my lassie,
Lift your sweet eyes trustingly,
Can you read the misty Future,
Can you tell what it shall be
Strange, unknown Eternity?

Shall the long years, swiftly passing,
Come between your life and me?
Shall another hear your footstep,
As you hasten eagerly,

To his side, to pour the tea?

While beside my own hearth lonely
Strangers coldly look on me—

Will you then remember, lassie,
How the night fell silently,

While you laughed and poured the tea? - Willis Boyd Allen.

ten nearly a dozen poems about them, and made many allusions to them, besides, in Evangeline and other works. And true it is that much that is beautiful and interesting in literature has been suggested by bells and is connected with them. Cowper, Coleridge, Moore, Lamb, Herbert, Holmes, Whittier, Longfellow, and many another, have all written in their sweetest strains about the bell.

From a very early period in the world's history, bells have been of great usefulness among all nations. They not only have been, but still are, the theme for the pen of poet, storyteller, and historian. How many bells there are in tower and steeple throughout the world it would be hard to tell; but they are ringing in every land, belting the world with melody; a continuous carillon of bell-music is ever sounding round the earth.

Sweet and tender are many of the strains that come to us from the poets. What memories are awakened when we hear read or sung the beautiful lay of Moore:

"Those evening bells! those evening bells! How many a tale their music tells!"

How gentle and sympathetic is Longfellow's tribute to Bayard Taylor:

"Friend! but yesterday the bells

Rang for thee their loud farewells;
And to-day they toll for thee,
Lying dead beyond the sea."

Coleridge says:

"'Tis sweet to hear a brook, 'tis sweet

To hear the Sabbath bell;

'Tis sweet to hear them both at once, Deep in a woody dell."

And Whittier :

"Bell, whose century-rusted tongue
Burials tolled, and bridals rung."

In "The Bells," of Poe;" Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky," of Tennyson; "The Bells of Shandon," of Mahoney; the "Church Bells," of Keble; the "Sabbath Bells," of Lamb; the "Christmas Bells," of Longfellow; the "Song of the Bell," by Schiller; - many a message and office of the bell is brought home to us; as also in that other German " Song of the Bell," translated by Longfellow :

"Bell! thou soundest merrily,
When the bridal party

To the church doth hie!
Bell! thou soundest solemnly,
When on Sabbath morning,

Fields deserted lie!
"Bell! thou soundest merrily;
Tellest thou at evening,

Bedtime draweth nigh!
Bell! thou soundest mournfully,
Tellest thou the bitter

Parting hath gone by!" etc.

It is interesting to consider the various names of bells and bell-ringings which have grown up through the customs of