That errand-bound 'Prentice was passing in

haste

What matter! he's caught-and his time runs

to waste;

The Newsman is stopped, though he stops on the fret;

And the half-breathless Lamplighter- he's in the net!

The Porter sits down on the weight which he

bore;

The Lass with her barrow wheels hither her

store;

If a thief could be here he might pilfer at ease; She sees the Musician, 'tis all that she sees!

He stands backed by the wall; - he abates not his din,

His hat gives him vigor, with boons dropping

in,

From the old and the young, from the poorest; and there!

The one-pennied Boy has his penny to spare.

O blest are the hearers, and proud be the hand

Of the pleasure it spreads through so thankful a band;

I am glad for him, blind as he is! - all the while

If they speak 'tis to praise, and they praise with a smile.

That tall Man, a giant in bulk and in height, Not an inch of his body is free from delight; Can he keep himself still, if he would? oh, not he!

The music stirs in him like wind through a

tree.

Mark that Cripple who leans on his crutch; like a tower

That long has leaned forward, leans hour after hour!

That Mother, whose spirit in fetters is bound, While she dandles the babe in her arms to the sound.

Now, coaches and chariots! roar on like a stream;

Here are twenty souls happy as souls in a

dream:

They are deaf to your murmurs

not for you,

they care

Nor what ye are flying, nor what ye pursue!

William Wordsworth.

MUSIC IN AN AVENUE

I

I knew the Minstrel not, and yet I knew
He played on pipes of Pan as he went by,
And that a passion boundless as the sky
Ran like a golden flame, his measures through.
I thought, this Minstrel will the gods pursue
Till they await his coming, nor deny
That their melodious ways together lie,

The while he dreams some deathless note to woo!

On, past me, like a nightingale he swept,
While the June air a-throb with music swayed,
On, through the avenue where the stone
hounds slept;

And as the western glory on them strayed,
I think they roused, but a fierce silence kept,
Quelled by the magic of the strains he played.

II

They who play pipes of Pan are never spent, And I shall hear from some resplendent height That he will reach in his imperial flight, Rapture on rapture by the Minstrel sent;

Elect to race with gods, behold he went Flying upon his way toward Love and Light, That are their fairest goals, and tuned to sight

Came face to face with the Omnipotent.

Flute on, O Minstrel in thy wondrous June! And all the lilies, listening thee, will blow, And 'cross more silver seas will sail the moon, Till with song-bladed wings thy soul shall go And out of some near Eden snatch a tune, That all the coming centuries shall know. Cara E. Whiton-Stone.

ON HEARING AN EOLIAN HARP

Sure 'tis the voice of choired saints that flows Along the billows of the softened breeze... And now, in falls and dying symphonies, So sweet it glides, that forth my rapt soul goes To join those hymnings, ta'en from all her

woes.

Yet once more, and once more, ye minstrel

sies

Of power, my stormy spirit to appease, With some dissolving dream my thoughts

compose.