A portion of their elements to create

Thy little form, though beauty dwells not there. So lean and gaunt, that economic fate

Meant thee to feed on music or on air.

Our vein's pure juices were not made for thee,
Thou living, singing, stinging atomy.

The hues of dying sunset are most fair,

And twilight's tints just fading into night, Most dusky soft, and so thy soft notes are

By far the sweetest when thou tak'st thy flight. The swan's last note is sweetest, so is thine;

Sweet are the wind harp's tones at distance heard; 'Tis sweet in distance at the day's decline,

To hear the opening song of evening's bird.
But notes of harp or bird at distance float
Less sweetly on the ear than thy last note.

The autumn winds are wailing: 'tis thy dirge;
Its leaves are sear, prophetic of thy doom.
Soon the cold rain will whelm thee, as the surge
Whelms the tost mariner in its watery tomb,
Then soar, and sing thy little life away!
Albeit thy voice is somewhat husky now.
'Tis well to end in music life's last day,

Of one so gleeful and so blithe as thou:
For thou wilt soon live through its joyous hours,
And pass away with Autumn's dying flowers.

INCONSTANCY.

BY J. R. DRAKE.

YES! I swore to be true, I allow,

And I meant it, but, some how or other,

The seal of that amorous vow

Was pressed on the lips of another.

Yet I did but as all would have done,
For where is the being, dear cousin,
Content with the beauties of one

When he might have the range of a dozen?

Young Love is a changeable boy,

And the gem of the sea-rock is like him,
For he gives back the beams of his joy
To each sunny eye that may strike him.

From a kiss of a zephyr and rose

Love sprang in an exquisite hour, And fleeting and sweet, heaven knows, Is this child of a sigh and a flower.

THE CALLICOON IN AUTUMN.

BY A. B. STREET.

FAR in the forest's heart, unknown,
Except to sun and breeze,
Where solitude her dreaming throne
Has held for centuries;

Chronicled by the rings and moss
That tell the flight of years across
The seamed and columned trees,
This lovely streamlet glides along
With tribute of eternal song!

Now, stealing through its thickets deep
In which the wood-duck hides,
Now, picturing in its basin sleep

Its green pool-hollowed sides,

Here, through the pebbles slow it creeps,
There, 'mid some wild abyss it sweeps,
And foaming, hoarsely chides;
Then slides so still, its gentle swell
Scarce ripples round the lily's bell.

Nature, in her autumnal dress
Magnificent and gay,

Displays her mantled gorgeousness

To hide the near decay,

Which, borne on Winter's courier breath, Warns the old year prepare for death,

When, tottering, seared, and gray, Ice-fettered, it will sink below

The choking winding-sheet of snow.

THE CALLICOON IN AUTUMN.

A blaze of splendour is around,

As wondrous and as bright
As that, within the fairy ground,
Which met Aladdin's sight.

The sky, a sheet of silvery sheen
With breaks of tenderest blue between,
As though the summer light

Was melting through, once more to cast
A glance of gladness ere it passed.

The south-west airs of ladened balm

Come breathing sweetly by,

And wake amid the forest's calm
One quick and shivering sigh,
Shaking, but dimpling not the glass
Of this smooth streamlet, as they pass-
They scarcely wheel on high

The thistle's downy, silver star,
To waft its pendent seed afar.

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Dream-like the silence, only woke
By the grasshopper's glee,
And now and then the lazy stroke
Of woodcock* on the tree :
And mingling with the insect hum,
The beatings of the partridge drum,

With frequently a bee

Darting its music, and the crow

Harsh cawing from the swamp below.

* Not the sportsman's favourite (scolopax minor) of our Atlantic shores, but

the large crested woodpecker, so called in the western counties.

A foliage world of glittering dyes
Gleams brightly on the air,
As though a thousand sunset skies,
With rainbows, blended there;
Each leaf an opal, and each tree
A bower of varied brilliancy,
And all one general glare

Of glory, that o'erwhelms the sight
With dazzling and unequalled light.

Rich gold with gorgeous crimson, here
The birch and maple twine,
The beech its orange mingles near
With emerald of the pine;

And e'en the humble bush and herb
Are glowing with those tints superb,
As though a scattered mine

Of gems, upon the earth were strewn,
Flashing with radiance, each its own.

All steeped in that delicious charm
Peculiar to our land,

Glimmering in mist, rich, purple, warm,
When Indian Summer's hand

Has filled the valley with its smoke, And wrapped the mountain in its cloak, While, timidly and bland,

The sunbeams struggle from the sky,

And in long lines of silver lie.

The squirrel chatters merrily,

The nut falls ripe and brown, And gem-like from the jewelled tree

The leaf comes fluttering down;