effect, as we may hope, of divine grace. And what is the conclusion to draw from all this? does it not cry with a loud voice for help from the faithful by prayer more and more general and fervent? and who are to be, if I may use the phrase, the apostles and the advocates of this devotion, or rather of this great effort for the conquest of England to the Holy Church, as the first step to other conquests still more extensive? Who shall I say, if not the sons of the Blessed Paul of the Cross, whose zeal for this object is spoken of by all Catholics throughout the world, especially since the period of his solemn Beatification?

In our last General Chapter it was resolved that we should seriously devote ourselves to this work of prayer. I have already said that I now speak for the purpose of returning thanks for that, which has been done already. But what I now have at heart is nothing else than what the words of the apostle express, that "you should abound more and more."

It is then, if I may say it, my earnest desire that while we, who belong to the English Province, are following our special vocation of carrying out the great object for which our Blessed Founder offered up such continual prayer, according to the spirit which his worthy son and imitator, Father Dominic of the Mother of God planted in our own England, his other sons, our dear brethren who remain here in Italy, should give us the powerful help of their prayers, rekindling more and more in themselves a spirit, in this especially like to his own, and striving to unite in the same spirit all the devout souls of this their country, Italy, specially those that are consecrated to God in the various religious houses established therein.

"We approve that the above document be printed after obtaining the revision and approbation of the Right Rev. Father General of the Order."

"Brother G. Gigli,

Master of the Sacred Apostolic Palace."

"We approve there is no reason to object."

"Peter Paul of our Lady of Sorrows,

General Provost of the Passionist Congregation."

ORIGINAL POETRY.

QUOMODO SEDET SOLA CIVITAS PLENA POPULO!".
LAM. i. 1.

WHERE a dark sea against a darker shore,
Breaks in a flash of sudden light, and fades
Out into mystery again, I roam
And listen to the music of the deep.
One star, beyond the limit of the cloud
That inks the heaven, greets me with a smile
In glimmer upon glimmer, on the crests

--

Of those great passionate waves; and I can wait,
And watch, and muse, and weep, as on the shore
Of my poor clouded life, the waves of thought, -
Thought of past days, break, and beget a gleam
Of happier memory, then fade, and die,
And are not.

For there was a time,-not long
Ago, though so much change has built a wall
Between it and To day ;- —a time of joy
A time of holy peace and faith and love;
Day after day, the sweet-toned Mattin-bell
Told JESU's early rising from the dead,

And called us to adore His Presence sweet
Or, morn and noon and night, the Ave's chime
Bade Christ's poor wandering sheep return to Him,
And pray for Mary's help; and all the day
In prayers and hymns, or tales of the sweet Saints
In doing God's own work, with God's own Love
Slipt by our happy youth,-a sea of peace
Laughing in a full sunlight ;-till they came,
The messengers of ill, to break and spoil;
They showed a warrant, and a royal seal,

They came with force of arms, and we were weak.
Our poor folk wept and prayed, and would have fought,
But we withheld them. Crowding to the Choir,
We sang the Litanies, while yet their scoffs
Rang through the cloisters with unwonted sound.
They burst into the Church and broke the Rood
And then,-O JESU, save us and forgive !—
They drew the World's Redeemer from His shrine
And trode Him underfoot, counting the Blood
Of the great Covenant an unholy thing.

Our Abbess strove to save them from the deed
And stood between them and their sacrilege.

G

They spurned her, and she fell, and yielded up
Her soul to the Himy trode on. May Thy peace,
Lord Christ, for this great act of dying love
Rest with her always, and may Mary's prayers
And all sweet Saints', bring her before Thy Face
To be with Thee for ever.

We wandered here and there upon the coast
Where the black rocks are beaten by the waves.
Some, a ship bore to a Christ-loving land;
One laid her on that rock the tide hath kist
And slept to wake in Paradise; and I,—

I wander here alone; a little cave

Shelters me from the storm of men and waves.
The fisher-men bring me their own rough fare
And ask my prayers. Good JESU be their friend
And give us Thy protection, for the world
Hath hated us for Thy dear Sake.

Athwart the blackness of the tossing waves.
The morning breaks. When shall that Morrow dawn
Upon Thy Vine forsaken? Lord, how long?

G. A. S.

THE SATURDAY REVIEW.

"LEARN to live, and live and learn,"
In the days when I used to go to school,
Would always pass for an excellent rule ;
But now it's grown a serious concern
The number of things I've had to unlearn
Since first I began the page to turn
Of The Saturday Review.

For once (I believe) I believed in truth

And love, and the hundred foolish things

One sees in one's dreams and believes in one's youth.

In Angels with curls, and in Angels with wings,

In Saints, and Heroes, and Shepherds too;

The pictures that David and Virgil drew
So sweetly, I thought were taken

From very life, but now I find

A Shepherd is but an uncouth Hind,

Songless, soulless, from time out of mind
Who has cared for nothing but bacon.

And though to confess it may well seem strange
When I had them by scores and dozens
(I was young, to be sure, and all things change),

I really have liked my cousins,

And schoolfellows too, and can bring to mind
Some uncles of mine who were truly kind.
And aunts who were far from crusty;
And even my country neighbours too
Did'nt seem by half such a tedious crew
As now I find they must be.

And I used to think it might be kind,
In the world's great marching order,
To help the poor stagglers left behind,
Halt and maimed, and broken and blind,
On their way to a distant border ;

Not to speak of the virtuous poor, I thought
There was here and there a sinner

Might be mended a little, though not of the sort
One would think of asking to dinner.
But now I find that no one believes
In Ragged Children, or Penitent Thieves,
Or Homeless Homes, but a few Old Maids
Who have tried and failed at all other trades,
And who take to these things for recreation
In their aimless life's dull Long Vacation.

And so as we're going along with the Priest And Levite (the roads are more dry in the East) We need have no hesitation,

When the mud is lying about so thick,

To scatter a little and let it stick

To the coat of the Good Samaritan, used

To be spattered, battered, blackened, and bruised;

These sort of people don't mind it the least-
Why, bless you, it's their vocation!

Yet sometimes I've thought it a little strange,—
When good people get such very hard change
In return for their kindly halfpence,

When the few who are grieved for sorrows and sins
Are bowled to the earth like wooden pins,
When to care for the heathen, or pity the slave,
Sets a man down for fool or knave,
With The Saturday in its sapience,—
Things that are mean and base and low
Are checked by never a word or blow;
The gaping crowds that go in hope
To see Blondin slip from the cruel rope
Tightened or slack, and come away
In trust of more luck another day,

Meet never a line's reproving;

Heenan and Sayers may pound and thwack
Each other blue and yellow and black,

And only get a pat on the back
From the Power that keeps all moving.

And I sometimes think, if this same Review,
And the world a little longer too

Should last, will the Violets come out blue;
Will the Rose be red, and will Lovers woo
In the foolish way that they used to do?
Will Doves in the summer woodlands coo,
And the Nightingales mourn without asking leave?
Will the Lark have an instinct left to cleave
The sunny air with her song and her wing?
Perhaps we may move to abolish Spring;
And now that we've grown so hard to please,

We may think that we're bored by the grass and the trees;
The Moon may be proved a piece of cheese,

Or an Operatic delusion.

Fathers and Mothers may have to go,
Brothers and Sisters be voted slow,
Christmas a tax that one's forced to pay,
And Heaven itself but an out of the way
Old-fashioned place that has had its day,
That one wouldn't residence choose in.

And though so easily learnt and brief
Is the form our new faith's put in,

When we've said, “I believe in a Round of Beef
And live by a Leg of Mutton,"

We come to another region of facts

That are met quite as well by the Gospel and Acts

As by any teaching that's newer

Life has its problems hard to clear,

And its knots too stiff to be cut by the sneer
Of the sharpest, smartest Reviewer.

October, 1863.

DORA GREENWELL.