Where the glare and the glitter and tinsel of Time
Fade and die in the light of that region sublime,
Where the soul, disenchanted of flesh and of sense,
Unscreened by its trappings and shows and pretense,
Must be clothed for the life and the service above,
With purity, truth, faith, meekness, and love,
O daughters of Earth! foolish virgins, beware!
Lest in that upper realm you have nothing to wear!
WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER.

Antony and Cleopatra.

I AM dying, Egypt, dying,

Ebbs the crimson life-tide fast,
And the dark Plutonian shadows
Gather on the evening blast;
Let thine arms, O Queen, infold me;
Hush thy sobs and bow thine ear;
Listen to the great heart-secrets,

Thou, and thou alone, must hear.

Though my scarred and veteran legions
Bear their eagles high no more,
And my wrecked and scattered galleys
Strew dark Actium's fatal shore;
Though no glittering guards surround me,
Prompt to do their master's will,

I must perish like a Roman,

Die the great Triumvir still.

Let not Cæsar's servile minions

Mock the lion thus laid low;

'T was no foeman's arm that felled him

'T was his own that struck the blow,—
His who, pillowed on thy bosom,

Turned aside from glory's ray—
His who, drunk with thy caresses,
Madly threw a world away.

Should the base plebeian rabble
Dare assail my name at Rome,
Where my noble spouse, Octavia,

Weeps within her widowed home,
Seek her; say the gods bear witness-
Altars, augurs, circling wings-
That her blood, with mine commingled,
Yet shall mount the throne of kings.

As for thee, star-eyed Egyptian!
Glorious sorceress of the Nile,
Light the path to Stygian horrors
With the splendors of thy smile.
Give the Cæsar crowns and arches,
Let his brow the laurel twine;
I can scorn the Senate's triumphs,
Triumphing in love like thine.

I am dying, Egypt, dying;

Hark! the insulting foeman's cry.
They are coming! quick, my falchion!
Let me front them ere I die.
Ah! no more amid the battle

Shall my heart exulting swell

Isis and Osiris guard thee!

Cleopatra, Rome, farewell!

WILLIAM HAINES LYTLE.

The Nautilus and the Ammonite.

THE nautilus and the ammonite

Were launched in friendly strife, Each sent to float in its tiny boat On the wide, wide sea of life.

For each could swim on the ocean's brim,
And, when wearied, its sail could furl,

And sink to sleep in the great sea-deep,

In its palace all of pearl.

And theirs was a bliss more fair than this

Which we taste in our colder clime; For they were rife in a tropic life—

A brighter and better clime.

They swam 'mid isles whose summer smiles
Were dimmed by no alloy;

Whose groves were palm, whose air was balm,
And life one only joy.

They sailed all day through creek and bay,
And traversed the ocean deep;

And at night they sank on a coral bank,
In its fairy bowers to sleep.

And the monsters vast of ages past
They beheld in their ocean caves;
They saw them ride in their power and pride,
And sink in their deep-sea graves.

And hand in hand, from strand to strand,
They sailed in mirth and glee;

These fairy shells, with their crystal cells,
Twin sisters of the sea.

And they came at last to a sea long past,
But as they reached its shore,

The Almighty's breath spoke out in death,
And the ammonite was no more.

So the nautilus now in its shelly prow,
As over the deep it strays,

Still seems to seek, in bay and creek,
Its companion of other days.

And alike do we, on life's stormy sea,

As we roam from shore to shore,
Thus tempest-tossed, seek the loved, the lost,
And find them on earth no more.

Yet the hope how sweet, again to meet,

As we look to a distant strand,

Where heart meets heart, and no more they part

Who meet in that better land.

ANONYMOUS.

Carmen Bellicosum.

In their ragged regimentals
Stood the old Continentals,

Yielding not,

When the grenadiers were lunging,
And like hail fell the plunging

Cannon-shot;

When the files

Of the isles,

[rampant

From une smoky night encampment, bore the banner of the

Unicorn,

[drummer,

And grummer, grummer, grummer rolled the roll of the

Through the morn!

Then with eyes to the front all,
And with guns horizontal,

Stood our sires;

And the balls whistled deadly,

And in streams flashing redly
Blazed the fires;

As the roar

On the shore,

Swept the strong battle-breakers o'er the green-sodded acres

Of the plain;

And louder, louder, louder cracked the black gunpowder,

Cracking amain!

Now like smiths at their forges
Worked the red St. George's
Cannoneers;

And the "villainous saltpetre"

Rung a fierce, discordant metre
Round their ears;

As the swift

Storm-drift,

With hot sweeping anger, came the horse-guard's clangor On our flanks.

Then higher, higher, higher burned the old-fashioned fire Through the ranks!

Then the old-fashioned colonel
Galloped through the white infernal
Powder-cloud;

And his broadsword was swinging,
And his brazen throat was ringing

Trumpet loud.

Then the blue

Bullets flew,

And the trooper-jackets redden at the touch of the leaden

Rifle-breath;

And rounder, rounder, rounder roared the iron six-pounder,

Hurling death!

GUY HUMPHREY MCMASTER.

Doris.

I SAT with Doris, the shepherd maiden;
Her crook was laden with wreathed flowers.
I sat and wooed her through sunlight wheeling,
And shadows stealing for hours and hours.

And she my Doris, whose lap incloses

Wild summer roses of faint perfume,

The while I sued her, kept hushed and hearkened
Till shades had darkened from gloss to gloom.