BEYOND the vague Atlantic deep,
Far as the farthest prairies sweep,
Where forest-glooms the nerve appal,
Where burns the radiant Western fall,
One duty lies on old and young,
With filial piety to guard,

As on its greenest native sward,
The glory of the English tongue.
That ample speech! that subtle speech!
Apt for the need of all and each:
Strong to endure, yet prompt to bend
Wherever human feelings tend.
Preserve its force, expand its powers,

And through the maze of civic life,

1 AUSTIN DOBSON, born in 1840, is an English poet, who has acquired reputation as the author of several volumes of graceful verses.

In Letters, Commerce, even in Strife,
Forget not it is yours and ours.

LORD HOUGHTON.1

THE END OF THE PLAY.

THE play is done; the curtain drops,
Slow falling to the prompter's bell:
A moment yet the actor stops,

And looks around, to say farewell.
It is an irksome word and task;

And, when he's laughed and said his say,
He shows, as he removes the mask,
A face that's anything but gay.

One word, ere yet the evening ends,
Let's close it with a parting rhyme,
And pledge a hand to all young friends,
As fits the merry Christmas time.
On life's wide scene you, too, have parts,
That Fate erelong shall bid you play;
Good night! with honest gentle hearts
A kindly greeting go alway!

Good-night! I'd say, the griefs, the joys,
Just hinted in this mimic page,

1 RICHARD MONCKTON MILNES, an English statesman and writer, was born in Yorkshire in 1809, and graduated at Cambridge University in 1831. He was elected to Parliament in 1837 for Pontefract, which he continued to represent until 1863, when he was raised to the peerage as Baron Houghton. He died in 1885.

The triumphs and defeats of boys,

Are but repeated in our age.

I'd say, your woes were not less keen,

Your hopes more vain, than those of men; Your pangs or pleasures of fifteen

At forty-five played o'er again.

I'd say we suffer and we strive

Not less nor more as men than boys; With grizzled beards at forty-five,

As erst at twelve in corduroys.

And if, in time of sacred youth,

We learned at home to love and pray, Pray Heaven that early Love and Truth May never wholly pass away.

And in the world, as in the school,

I'd say, how fate may change and shift;
The prize be sometimes with the fool,
The race not always to the swift.

The strong may yield, the good may fall,
The great man be a vulgar clown,

The knave be lifted over all,

The kind cast pitilessly down.

Who knows the inscrutable design?
Blessed be He who took and gave!
Why should your mother, Charles, not mine,
Be weeping at her darling's grave?
We bow to Heaven that will'd it so,
That darkly rules the fate of all,
That sends the respite or the blow,
That's free to give, or to recall.

This crowns his feast with wine and wit:

Who brought him to that mirth and state?

His betters, see, below him sit,

Or hunger hopeless at the gate. Who bade the mud from Dives' wheel of Lazarus?

To spurn the rags
Come, brother, in that dust we 'll kneel,
Confessing Heaven that ruled it thus.

So each shall mourn, in life's advance,
Dear hopes, dear friends, untimely killed;
Shall grieve for many a forfeit chance,
And longing passion unfulfilled.
Amen! whatever fate be sent,

Pray God the heart may kindly glow,
Although the head with cares be bent,
And whitened with the winter snow.

Come wealth or want, come good or ill,
Let young and old accept their part,
And bow before the Awful Will,

And bear it with an honest heart,
Who misses or who wins the prize.
Go, lose or conquer as you can;
But if you fail, or if you rise,
Be each, pray God, a gentleman.

A gentleman, or old or young!

(Bear kindly with my humble lays);
The sacred chorus first was sung
Upon the first of Christmas days:
The shepherds heard it overhead-
The joyful angels raised it then:
Glory to Heaven on high, it said,
And peace on earth to gentle men.

My song, save this, is little worth;
I lay the weary pen aside,

And wish you health, and love, and mirth,

As fits the solemn Christmas-tide.

As fits the holy Christmas birth,

Be this, good friends, our carol still,
Be peace on earth, be peace on earth,
To men of gentle will.

WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY

SAY NOT THE STRUGGLE NOUGHT

AVAILETH.

SAY not the struggle nought availeth,
The labor and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not, nor faileth,
And as things have been they remain.

If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;
It may be, in yon smoke concealed,
Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers,
And, but for you, possess the field.

For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,
Seem here no painful inch to gain,
Far back, through creeks and inlets making,
Comes silent, flooding in, the main.

And not by eastern windows only,

When daylight comes, comes in the light, In front, the sun climbs slow, how slowly, But westward, look, the land is bright.

ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH.