THE COUCH BY FRIENDSHIP SPREAD.

How sweet the couch by friendship spread,

Though coarse its quilt, and hard its fold! Where shall the wanderer find a bed,

Though heaped with down, and hung with gold, So dearly loved, so warm, so soft,

As that where he hath lain so oft?

Oh! when our frame with toil is tired,
Or travel-worn our wearied feet,
What then so much to be desired,

So cheering, soothing, and so sweet,

As our own ingle's fitful gleams,
And our own couch of rosy dreams?

When 'nighted on the mountain road,
While o'er the rugged rocks we climb,
Fancy portrays our own abode,

And nerves anew each fainting limb
To struggle with the dreary steep-
For dear is our own bed of sleep.

And, oh! when on a distant coast,

Our steps are stayed by dire disease,

Who then, of those who watch the most,
Though kind, can have the power to please

Like those who watched disease's strife,

At home, and soothed us back to life?

Where is the heart's soft silver chain

Which binds to earth our spirits weak,

Pardons the peevishness of pain,

Supplies the wants we cannot speak, And with well-tried and patient care Inspires our love and prompts our prayer.

Alas! though kind the stranger's eye,
And kind his heart as heart can be,
There is a want, we know not why,
A face beloved we cannot see--
A something round our aching head,
Unlike our own endearing bed.

When fired by fever's phantom chase,
We fling aside the curtain's fold,
It shows a face-a pitying face-
But ah! to us its cast seems cold,
And, with our last remains of pride,
We vainly strive our pain to hide.

But dear to us are those who wait
Around our couch with kindred pain-
The long familiar friend or mate,
Whose softness woos us to complain-
Whose tear meets every tear that flows,
Whose sympathy relieves our woes.

Oh

may I have in life and death, A bed where I may lay me down; A home, a friend, whose every breath

May blend and mingle with my ownWhose heart with mine in joy may beat, Whose eye with mine in pain may meet!

And when at last the hour is come

Which bids my joy and sorrow cease; When my pale lips grow hushed and dumb, And my tired soul hath fled in peace, Then may some friend lay down my head Into its cold and narrow bed.

BETHUNE.

LOVE AND DEATH.

WHAT time the mighty moon was gathering light,
Love paced the thymy plots of Paradise,

And all about him rolled his lustrous eyes;
When, turning round a cassia, full in view,

Death, walking all alone beneath a yew,

And talking to himself, first met his sight:

"You must begone," said Death, "these walks are mine."

Love wept and spread his sheeny vans for flight;

Yet ere he parted, said, "This hour is thine:
Thou art the shadow of life, and as the tree
Stands in the sun and shadows all beneath,
So in the light of great eternity

Life eminent creates the shade of death;
The shadow passeth when the tree shall fall,
But I shall reign for ever over all."

TENNYSON.

THE BRIDE.

FROM IN MEMORIAM."

COULD we forget the widowed hour,
And look on spirits breathed away,

As on a maiden in the day

When first she wears her orange-flower;

When, crowned with blessing, she doth rise
To take her latest leave of home,

And hopes and light regrets that come,
Make April of her tender eyes;

And doubtful joys the father move,
And tears are on the mother's face,
As, parting with a long embrace,
She enters other realms of love;

Her office there to rear, to teach,
Becoming, as is meet and fit,
A link among the days, to knit
The generations each with each;

And, doubtless, unto thee is given
A life that bears immortal fruit,
In such great offices as suit
The full-grown energies of heaven.

Ay me, the difference I discern!

How often shall her old fireside

Be cheered with tidings of the bride! How often she herself return,

And tell them all they would have told,
And bring her babe, and make her boast,
Till even those that missed her most,
Shall count new things as dear as old!

But thou and I have shaken hands,
Till growing winters lay me low;
My paths are in the fields I know,
And thine in undiscovered lands.

TENNYSON.

GODIVA.

Nor only we, the latest seed of Time,
New men, that in the flying of a wheel

Cry down the past; not only we, that prate
Of rights and wrongs, have loved the people well,
And loathed to see them overtaxed; but she
Did more, and underwent, and overcame,
The woman of a thousand summers back,
Godiva, wife to that grim Earl, who ruled
In Coventry: for when he laid a tax

Upon his town, and all the mothers brought

Their children, clamouring-" If we pay, we starve," She sought her lord, and found him, where he strode About the hall, among his dogs, alone,

His beard a foot before him, and his hair

A yard behind. She told him of their tears,

And prayed him, "If they pay this tax, they starve." Whereat he stared, replying, half-amazed,

"You would not let your little finger ache

For such as these?"-"But I would die," said she, He laughed, and swore by Peter and by Paul:

Then filliped at the diamond in her ear;

66

O, ay, ay, ay, you talk !”—“ Alas!" she said,
"But prove me what it is I would not do."
And from a heart as rough as Esau's hand,
He answered, "Ride you naked through the towa,
And I repeal it ;" and nodding, as in scorn,
He parted, with great strides among his dogs.

So left alone, the passions of her mind,
As winds from all the compass shift and blow,
Made war upon each other for an hour,