you,

Old year, you shall not die ;
We did so laugh and cry with
I've half a mind to die with you,
Old year, if you must die.

He was full of joke and jest,

But all his merry quips are o'er,

To see him die, across the waste

His son and heir doth ride post haste,

But he'll be dead before.

Every one for his own.

The night is starry and cold, my friend,
And the new year blithe and bold, my friend,
Comes up to take his own.

How hard he breathes! over the snow
I heard just now the crowing cock.
The shadows flicker to and fro:

The cricket chirps: the light burns low :
'Tis nearly twelve o'clock.

Shake hands, before you die.

Old year, we'll dearly rue for you:
What is it we can do for you?
Speak out before you die.

His face is growing sharp and thin,
Alack! our friend is gone.

Close up his eyes: tie up

his chin:

Step from the corpse, and let him in
That standeth there alone,

And waiteth at the door.

There's a new foot on the floor, my friend,
And a new face at the door, my friend,

A new face at the door.

CCCLXIV. MARTIN F. TUPPER, 1811—

1. STUDY OF NATURE.

That which may profit and amuse is gathered from the volume of creation,

For every chapter therein teemeth with the playfulness of wisdom.

The elements of all things are the same, though nature hath mixed them with a difference,

And learning delighteth to discover the affinity of seeming opposites:

So out of great things and small draweth he the secrets of the universe,

And argueth the cycles of the stars, from a pebble flung by a child.

It is pleasant to note all plants, from the rush to the spreading cedar,

From the giant king of palms, to the lichen that staineth its stem;

To watch the workings of instinct, that grosser reason of brutes,

The river horse browsing in the jungle, the plover screaming on the moor,

The cayman basking on a mud-bank, and the walrus anchored to an iceberg,

The dog at his master's feet, and the milch-kine lowing in the meadow.

To trace the consummate skill that hath modelled the anatomy of insects,

Small fowls that sun their wings on the petals of wildflowers;

To learn a use in the beetle, and more than a use in the butterfly;

To recognise affections in a moth, and look with admiration on a spider.

It is glorious to gaze upon the firmament, and see from far the mansions of the blest,

Each distant shining world, a kingdom for one of the redeemed;

To read the antique history of earth, stamped upon those

medals in the rocks

Which design hath rescued from decay, to tell of the green infancy of time;

To gather from the unconsidered shingle the mottled starlike agates,

Full of unstoried flowers in the budding bloom-chalcedony ;

Orgay and curious shells, fretted with microscopic carving, Corallines, and fresh sea weeds, spreading forth their delicate branches,

It is an admirable lore to learn the cause in the change, To study the chemistry of nature, her grand but simple

secrets,

To search out all her wonders, to track the resources of her skill,

To note her kind compensations, her unobtrusive excellence.

In all it is wise happiness to see the well-ordained laws of Jehovah,

The harmony that filleth all his mind, the justice that tempereth his bounty,

The wonderful all-prevalent analogy that testifieth one Creator,

The broad arrow of the Great King, carved on all the stores of his arsenal.

2. MAN.

Yet more, thou may'st know,
If it list thee, to mind,

That many things go

Over earth in their kind,

Unlike to the view

In shape as in hue.

Known or unknown,

Some forms of them all

On earth lying prone

Must creep and must crawi;

By feathers help'd not,

Nor walking on feet,

As it is their lot,

Earth they must eat.
Two-footed these,
Four-footed those,
Each one with ease

Its going well knows,

Some flying high
Up to the sky.

Yet to this earth

Is everything bound,

Bowed from its birth
Down to the ground,
Looking on clay

And leaning to dust,
Some as they may,

And some as they must.

Man alone goes

Of all things upright,
Whereby he shows

That his mind and his might

Ever should rise

Up to the skies.

Unless like the beast
His mind is intent
Downwards to feast,
It cannot be meant
That any man

So far should sink
Upwards to scan,

Yet, downwards to think.

CCCLXV. EDGAR A. POE, 1811--1849.

THE RAVEN.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a

tapping,

As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber

door;

""Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber-door

Only this, and nothing more." Ah! distinctly I rer.ember it was in the bleak December, And each sep'rate dying ember wrought its ghost upon

the floor.

Eagerly I wished the morrow; vainly I had sought to borrow

From

my books surcease of sorrow-sorrow for the lost Lenore

For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore

Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain

Thrilled me, filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;

So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating:

"'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamberdoor

Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber

door:

This it is, and nothing more."

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no

longer,

"Sir," said I "or madam, truly your forgiveness I implore ;

But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,

And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber-door,

That I scarce was sure I heard you" here I opened wide the door;

Darkness there, and nothing more. Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,

Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;

But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,

And the only word there spoken was the whispered word" Lenore!"

This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word "Lenore!"

Merely this, and nothing more. Back into my chamber turning, all my soul within mə burning,