BAY LEAF.

G. W. DOANE.

In bower and garden rich and rare
There 's many a cherished flower,
Whose beauty fades, whose fragrance flits
Within the flitting hour.

Not so the simple forest-leaf,
Unprized, unnoticed lying-

The same through all its little life-
It changes but in dying.

Be such, and only such, my friends;
Once mine, and mine forever;
And here's a hand to clasp in theirs,
That shall desert them never.
And thou be such, my gentle love;
Time, chance, the world defying;
And take, 't is all I have, a heart
That changes but in dying.

No, let the eagle change his plume,
The leaf its hue, the flower its bloom,
But ties round this heart were spun
That could not, would not be undone.

THE SMALL CELANDINE.

WORDSWORTH.

There is a flower, the lesser celandine,

That shrinks, like many more, from cold and rain ; And, the first moment that the sun may shine, Bright as the sun itself, 't is out again.

When hailstones have been falling, swarm on swarm,

Or blasts the green field and the trees distressed, Oft have I seen it muffled up from harm,

In close self-shelter, like a thing at rest.

But lately, one rough day, this flower I passed, And recognized it, though an altered form, Now standing forth an offering to the blast, And buffeted at will by rain and storm.

I stopped, and said, with inly-muttered voice,
It doth not love the shower, nor seek the cold:
This neither is its courage nor its choice,
But its necessity in being old

The sunshine may not bless it, nor the dew;
It cannot help itself in its decay;

Stiff in its members, withered, changed of hue.' And, in my spleen I smiled that it was gray.

TO THE FRINGED GENTIAN.

BRYANT.

Thou blossom bright with autumn dew And colored with the heaven's own blue, Thou openest when the quiet light Succeeds the keen and frosty night.

Thou comest not when violets lean
O'er wandering brooks and springs unseen,
Or columbines, in purple dress,

Nod o'er the ground-bird's hidden nest.

Thou waitest late, and com'st alone, When woods are bare and birds are flown, And frosts and shortening days portend The aged year is near its end.

Then doth thy sweet and quiet eye
Look through its fringes to the sky,
Blue-blue-as if that sky let fall
A flower from its cerulean wall.

I would that thus, when I shall see
The hour of death draw near to me,
Hope, blossoming within my heart,
May look to heaven as I depart.

A FLOWER FROM MOUNT VERNON.

MIES L. P. SMITH.

Bright blossom! thou hast breathed the air Around our hero's tomb

What do the night-winds murmur there,
When skies are wrapt in gloom?

A dirge above the sleeping one,

Of giant heart and arm?

Above a race of glory run,

Whose memory has a charm

To thrill young hearts, and lift them up
To thirst for glory's gilded cup?

Sneds not the moon in radiance there
A brighter, holier light?

Look not the stars with smiles more fair,

From off the brow of night?

Send not the dews, which bathe that steep,

A fragrant incense round,

As they were sacred tears, to weep

O'er fame that death has crowned? Didst thou not bow thy head, bright gem

Of Nature's peerless diadem,

O'er him who sleeps in glory there,
Beneath a nation's grateful prayer.

The Wanderer and the Night Flowers.

MRS. HEMANS.

Call back your odors, lovely flowers,
From the night-winds call them back,

And fold your leaves till the laughing hours
Come forth in the sunbeam's track.

The lark lies couched in her grassy nest,

And the honey-bee is gone,

And all bright things are away to rest,
Why watch ye here alone?

Is not your world a mournful one

When your sisters close their eyes,

And your soft breath meets not a lingering tone Of song in the starry skies?

Take ye no joy in the day-spring's birth,

When it kindles the sparks of dew,

And the thousand strains of the forest's mirth, Shall they gladden all but you?

Shut your sweet bells till the fawn comes out
On the sunny turf to play,

And the woodland child, with a fairy shout,
Goes dancing on its way.