"I have left a good woman who never was here," The stranger he made reply;

"But that my draught should be better for that, I pray you answer me why."

"St. Keyne, "quoth the countryman, "many a time Drank of this crystal well,

And before the angel summoned her
She laid on the water a spell.

"If the husband of this gifted well
Shall drink before his wife,
A happy man thenceforth is he,
For he shall be master for life.

"But if the wife should drink of it first,
Heaven help the husband then!"
The stranger stooped to the well of St. Keyne,
And drank of the waters again.

"You drank of the well, I warrant, betimes?" He to the countryman said.

But the countryman smiled as the stranger spake, And sheepishly shook his head.

"I hastened, as soon as the wedding was done, And left my wife in the porch.

But i' faith, she had been wiser than me,
For she took a bottle to church."

ROBERT SOUTHEY.

HOME, SWEET HOME.

FROM THE OPERA OF "CLARI, the Maid of MILAN."
MID pleasures and palaces though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble there's no place like home!
A charm from the skies seems to hallow us here,
Which, seek through the world, is ne'er met with
elsewhere.

Home! home! sweet, sweet home!
There's no place like home!

An exile from home, splendor dazzles in vain!
O, give me my lowly thatched cottage again!
The birds singing gayly that came at my call;-
Give me them and the peace of mind dearer
than all !

Flashes the lovelight, increasing the glory, Beaming from bright eyes with warmth of the soul,

Telling of trust and content the sweet story,
Lifting the shadows that over us roll.

King, king, crown me the king:

Home is the kingdom, and Love is the king!

Richer than miser with perishing treasure,

Served with a service no conquest could bring; Happy with fortune that words cannot measure, Light-hearted I on the hearthstone can sing. King, king, crown me the king:

Home is the kingdom, and Love is the king.

REV. WILLIAM RANKIN DURYEA.

Without disease, the healthful life; The household of continuance;

The mean diet, no delicate fare;
True wisdom joined with simpleness;
The night dischargéd of all care,
Where wine the wit may not oppress;

The faithful wife, without debate;
Such sleeps as may beguile the night;
Contented with thine own estate,
Ne wish for death, ne fear his might.

LORD SURREY.

A SHEPHERD'S LIFE.

FROM THIRD PART OF HENRY VI."

KING HENRY. O God! methinks, it were a happy life,

To be no better than a homely swain ;

To sit upon a hill, as I do now,

To carve out dials quaintly, point by point,
Thereby to see the minutes how they run;
How many make the hour full complete ;
How many hours bring about the day;
How many days will finish up the year;
How many years a mortal man may live.
When this is known, then to divide the times,
So many hours must I tend my flock;

So

many hours must I take my rest; So many hours must I contemplate; So many hours must I sport myself;

So many days my ewes have been with young;
So many weeks ere the poor fools will yean;
So many years ere I shall shear the fleece :
Sominutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and years,
Passed over to the end they were created,
Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave.
Ah, what a life were this! how sweet! how lovely!
Gives not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shade
To shepherds, looking on their silly sheep,
Than doth a rich embroidered canopy
To kings that fear their subjects' treachery?

SHAKESPEARE.

THE MEANS TO ATTAIN HAPPY LIFE.

MARTIAL, the things that do attain

The happy life be these, I find, The riches left, not got with pain;

The fruitful ground, the quiet mind, The equal friend; no grudge, no strife; No charge of rule, nor governance;

THE FIRESIDE.

DEAR Chloe, while the busy crowd,
The vain, the wealthy, and the proud,
In folly's maze advance;
Though singularity and pride.

Be called our choice, we'll step aside.
Nor join the giddy dance.

From the gay world we 'll oft retire
To our own family and fire,

Where love our hours employs;
No noisy neighbor enters here,
No intermeddling stranger near,
To spoil our heartfelt joys.

If solid happiness we prize,
Within our breast this jewel lies,
And they are fools who roam;
The world hath nothing to bestow,
From our own selves our bliss must flow,
And that dear hut, our home.

Our portion is not large, indeed; But then how little do we need,

For nature's calls are few; In this the art of living lies, To want no more than may suffice, And make that little do.

We'll therefore relish with content
Whate'er kind Providence has sent,
Nor aim beyond our power;
For, if our stock be very small,
'Tis prudence to enjoy it all,

Nor lose the present hour.

To be resigned when ills betide, Patient when favors are denied,

A WINTER'S EVENING HYMN TO MY

FIRE.

O THOU of home the guardian Lar,
And when our earth hath wandered far
Into the cold, and deep snow covers
The walks of our New England lovers,
Their sweet secluded evening-star!
"T was with thy rays the English Muse
Ripened her mild domestic hues :
"T was by thy flicker that she conned
The fireside wisdom that enrings
With light from heaven familiar things;
By thee she found the homely faith
In whose mild eyes thy comfort stay'th,
When Death, extinguishing his torch,
Gropes for the latch-string in the porch ;
The love that wanders not beyond
His earliest nest, but sits and sings
While children smooth his patient wings:
Therefore with thee I love to read

Our brave old poets: at thy touch how stirs
Life in the withered words! how swift recede
Time's shadows! and how glows again
Through its dead mass the incandescent verse,
As when upon the anvils of the brain
It glittering lay, cyclopically wrought
By the fast-throbbing hammers of the poet's
thought!

Thou murmurest, too, divinely stirred,
The aspirations unattained,

The rhythms so rathe and delicate,
They bent and strained

And broke, beneath the sombre weight
Of any airiest mortal word.

As who would say, "Tis those, I ween,
Whom lifelong armor-chafe makes lean
That win the laurel";

While the gray snow-storm, held aloof,
To softest outline rounds the roof,
Or the rude North with baffled strain
Shoulders the frost-starred window-pane !
Now the kind nymph to Bacchus borne
By Morpheus' daughter, she that seems
Gifted upon her natal morn

By him with fire, by her with dreams,.
Nicotia, dearer to the Muse

Than all the grapes' bewildering juice,
We worship, unforbid of thee;
And, as her incense floats and curls
In airy spires and wayward whirls,
Or poises on its tremulous stalk

A flower of frailest revery,
So winds and loiters, idly free,
The current of unguided talk,

Now laughter-rippled, and now caught
In smooth dark pools of deeper thought.