TEARS.

O YE tears! O ye tears! that have long refused to flow, Ye are welcome to my heart, thawing, thawing, like

the snow;

I feel the hard clod soften, and the early snow-drops

spring,

And the healing fountains gush, and the wildernesses sing.

O ye tears! O ye tears! I am thankful that ye run; Though ye trickle in the darkness, ye shall glisten in the sun.

The rainbow cannot shine, if the drops refuse to fall, And the eyes that cannot weep, are the saddest eyes of all.

O ye tears! O ye tears! till I felt ye on my cheek, I was selfish in my sorrow; I was stubborn, I was weak.

Ye have giv'n me strength to conquer, and I stand erect and free,

And know that I am human, by the light of sympa

thy.

O ye tears! O ye tears! ye relieve me of my pain ; The barren rock of Pride has been stricken once again : Like the rock that Moses smote amid Horeb's burning sand,

It yields the flowing water, to make gladness in the land.

There is light upon my path! there is sunshine in my heart!

And the leaf and fruit of life shall not utterly depart. Ye restore to me the freshness and the bloom of long

ago

O ye tears! happy tears! I am thankful that ye flow!

LITTLE AT FIRST-BUT GREAT AT LAST.

A TRAVELLER through a dusty road,
Strewed acorns on the lea,

And one took root, and sprouted up,

And grew into a tree.

Love sought its shade at evening time,
To breathe its early vows,

And Age was pleased, in heats of noon,
To bask beneath its boughs:

The dormouse loved its dangling twigs,

The birds sweet music bore;

It stood a glory in its place,
A blessing evermore!

A little spring had lost its way
Amid the grass and fern;
A passing stranger scoop'd a well,
Where weary men might turn;
He wall'd it in, and hung with care
A ladle at the brink

He thought not of the deed he did,

But judg'd that toil might drink.

1

He pass'd again — and lo! the well,

By summers never dried,

Had cooled ten thousand parching tongues,

And saved a life beside!

A dreamer dropp'd a random thought;

'Twas old, and yet was new— A simple fancy of the brain,

But strong in being true;
It shone upon a genial mind,
And lo! its light became
A lamp of life, a beacon ray,
A monitory flame.

The thought was small

A watch-fire on the hill,

its issue great:

It sheds its radiance far adown,
And cheers the valley still!

A nameless man, amid a crowd
That throng'd the daily mart,
Let fall a word of Hope and Love,
Unstudied, from the heart;

A whisper on the tumult thrown -
A transitory breath-

It raised a brother from the dust,
It saved a soul from death.

O germ! O fount! O word of love!
O thought at random cast!

Ye were but little at the first,
But mighty at the last!

HAPPY LOVE.

SINCE the sweet knowledge I possess
That she I love is mine,

All Nature throbs with happiness,
And wears a face divine.

The woods seem greener than they were,
The skies are brighter blue;

The stars shine clearer, and the air

Lets finer sunlight through.

Until I loved I was a child,
And sported on the sands;
But now the ocean opens out,
With all its happy lands.

The circles of my sympathy
Extend from earth to heaven:

I strove to pierce a mystery,

And lo! the clue is given.

The woods, with all their boughs and leaves,

Are preachers of delight,

And wandering clouds in summer eves

Are Edens to my sight.