I met 'neath the acacias

My chrysolite of girls, Sunny Marguerite the golden, My pretty "pearl of pearls."

Her blue eyes to me are lodestars ;
Each brown ringlet is a snare
To enslave my heart in meshes,—
Oh, why are women fair?

Why do birds fall to the fowler? Why do moths fly to the flame? Why do tiny sparks fly upward? Can you give that fate a name?

"It is destiny," say women;

"It is kismet," say the Turks; "Magnetism," say the sages;

Yet still the soft spell works.

And 'twill work, and work for ages,
Till the ocean meets the sky:
"Twill be writ on all life's pages
Till the ink on them grows dry.
Astley H. Baldwin.

THE HOUR OF MEETING.
WHEN is love most true and tender,
Dignified-divinely pure?
When shall kindred bosoms render
Love for love that will endure?
Is it when the noonday's glory

Show'rs its splendours all around;
And affection's ardent story

Spreads enchantment o'er the ground?

Can it be when Nature, teeming,

Fills the languid breeze with balm? And th' enraptured heart is dreaming In a fair deluded calm? When 'tis impulse rules the reason

And th' unponder'd die is thrown, Which, mayhap, in sorrow's season, Worlds we'd offer to atone.

Oh, 'tis 'neath the light celestial

Of the calm, unclouded moonGuarding, like a radiant vestal,

Hearts that tenderly commune; Far from festive, wild commotion, Wand'ring in a sylvan sceneHallow'd to that chaste devotion,

Which is constant while serene ;

A cluster of stars hangs like fruit in the tree, The fall of the water comes sweeter, comes clearer ;

To what art thou listening, and what dost thou see?

Let the star-clusters grow,
Let the sweet waters flow,
And cross quickly to me!

You night-moths that hover where honey brims over

From sycamore blossoms, or settle or sleep;

You glowworms, shine out, and the pathway discover

To him that comes darkling along the rough steep.

Ah, my dearest, make haste,
For the time runs to waste,
And my love lieth deep-

Too deep for swift telling; and yet, my one lover,

I've conn'd thee an answer, it waits thee to-night.

By the sycamore pass'd he, and thro' the white clover,

Then all the sweet speech I had fashion'd took flight:

But I'll love him more, more
Than e'er wife loved before,
Be the days dark or bright.
Jean Ingelow.

LOVE'S MEETING-PLACE.

How many a magic Love doth quite
Perform in one short summer night-
Wherein is scarcely space for dreams,
While, on each side the world, it seems
The days nigh join with amber hands,
Over the dimly gleaming lands,

Where under thin-veil'd shifting sky
Gleams many a flower with white eye
Unclosed-On moonlight paven path
How many a meeting-place Love hath-
Where dreams, or yearning thoughts that
thrill,

Parted in vain, may find their will, And come together as they range, And fall into sweet interchange

Like waves with waves, whereof some sign
Felt at the trembling ripple-line

Of either brimming heart, doth bring
A rich unwonted comforting!

Arthur W. E. O'Shaughnessy.

MEETING OF LOVERS.

Of all the things a man may have
Before he cometh to the grave,-

Of all the joys that he may win
This is the richest to possess
One yearned-for hour in loneliness,
Beside one's love, in some fair clime,
In some fair purple autumn time;
For quite shall be forgotten then
The pains and labours among men,
The bitter things of thought and fear;
The bitter ends of hope; and, near,
Quite at one's side, yea, on one's heart,
Yea, touching, with no more to part,
The yearning hands or looks that meet,
Shall seem the often dreamed-of sweet
Much more than all the glowing things
To which the fondest memory clings-

Much more than any rapturous past: And this-the fairest moment, sure, In each man's life-it shall endure Some noon; while creeping twilight dims Slowly some flower's purple rims,

Or some green distance suffers change
Fading before us: then this strange
And precious rapture-it shall pass,
And never come again, alas!

Nay, for there shall be bliss and bliss,
And love and love, and kiss and kiss,
And many a pleasant touch of hands,
And place for love in many lands,
And communings of heart with heart,
Much to be gained, much to impart,
All these; but surely, never more
Doth any time at all restore
That faded purple of delight,

And the same sweet and the same sight,
As when one's love in that fair place
Blush'd with strange crimson, face to face,
With every inward passionate thought,
Into real living blisses wrought,

And the heart, through some mystery, Seem'd filling earths and heavens to beYea, things and spaces dimly knownWith endless feelings of its own.

Hereafter, surely I may say,
That, many an hour in night or day,
Those lovers knew some precious part
Of all the joy that heart with heart
Can so beget. Often they came,
And found that silken place the same,
In purple growing glooms at eve;
And sat while pleasure would deceive
Their thoughts with many a changing dream
Wrought of each momentary gleam
Of the unearthly twilight blue,

That seem'd to make the world anew,
Like some enamell'd picture fair
With jewell❜d stars and leaves: now there,
And now, in wanderings amid
The pleasant flower-paths, half-hid
Beneath safe shadows of the trees,
They dream'd some dream enough to please
All silently; or, one by one,

In their own soft and murmurous tone,
Spoke all the spells that Love hath set
In wild sweet words, that ever fret
The lips of lovers, till his gold
And honied secret be all told.

Arthur W. E. O'Shaughnessy.

THE GARDEN WHERE WE MET.

HERE'S the garden she walk'd across,

Arm in my arm, such a short while since : Hark, now I push its wicket, the moss Hinders the hinges and makes them wince;

She must have reach'd this shrub ere she turn'd,

As back with that murmur the wicket

swung ;

For she laid the poor snail my chance foot spurn'd,

To feed and forget it the leaves among.

Down this side of the gravel-walk

She went while her robe's edge brush'd the
box :

And here she paused in her gracious talk
To point me a moth on the milk-white flox.
Rose, ranged in a valiant row,

I will never think that she pass'd you by! She loves you, noble roses, I know,

But yonder, see where the rock-plants lie! This flower she stopp'd at, finger on lip,

Stoop'd over, in doubt as settling its claim; Till she gave me, with pride to make no slip, Its soft meandering Spanish name. What a name! was it love or praise?

Speech half-asleep, or song half-awake? I must learn Spanish one of these days, If only for that slow sweet name's sake.

Roses, if I live and do well,

I may bring her one of these days To fix you fast with as fine a spell,

Fit you each with his Spanish phrase; But do not detain me now; for she lingers There like sunshine over the ground, And ever I see her soft white fingers Searching after the bud she found.

Flower, you Spaniard, look that you grow not,

Stay as you are and be lovèd for ever! Bud, if I kiss you, 'tis that you blow not;

Mind, the shut pink mouth opens never! For while thus it pouts, her fingers wrestle,

Twinkling the audacious leaves between, Till round they turn and down they nestleIs not the dear mark still to be seen?

wrong;

Across the bridge where laugh'd the stream; along

The road to where her gabled mansion stood, Old, tall, and spacious, in a massy wood.

We loiter'd toward the porch; but paused meanwhile

Where Psyche holds a dial to beguile
The hours of sunshine by her golden smile;
And holds it like a goblet brimm'd with wine,
Nigh clad in trails of tangled eglantine.

In the deep peacefulness which shone around My soul was soothed: no darksome vision frown'd

Before my sight while cast upon the ground Where Psyche's and my Lady's shadows lay, Twin graces on the flower-edged gravel-way.

I then but yearn'd for Titian's glorious power,
That I by toiling one devoted hour
Might check the march of Time, and leave a
dower

Of rich delight, that beauty I could see,
For broadening generations yet to be.
Thomas Woolner.

TWO WAYS OF MEETING.

I MET her in the quiet lane
One Sabbath morning early;
The sun was bright, altho' the rain
Still glitter'd on the barley.
The lark was singing to his mate,

The wild bells chimed their warning, We paused awhile outside the gate, We linger'd till it was too late

To go to church that morning.

THE PEACEFUL ARBOUR.

HERE'S the place to seat us, love!
A perfect arbour! Look above,
How the delicate sprays, like hair,
Bend them to the breaths of air!
Listen, too! It is a rill,
Telling us its gentle will.
Who that knows what luxury is
Could go by a place like this?
66 Anacreon."
Translated by Leigh Hunt.

WHEN ripen'd time and chasten'd will Have stretch'd and tuned for love's accords

The five-string'd lyre of life, until

It vibrates with the wind of words; And 'Woman,' 'Lady,' 'She,' and 'Her'

Are names for perfect good and fair, And unknown maidens, talk'd of, stir

His thoughts with reverential care ; He meets, by heavenly chance express,

His destined wife: some hidden hand Unveils to him that loveliness

Which others cannot understand. No songs of love, no summer dreams Did e'er his longing fancy fire With vision like to this: she seems

In all things better than desire. His merits in her presence grow,

To match the promise in her eyes, And round her happy footsteps blow The authentic airs of Paradise. For love of her he cannot sleep;

Her beauty haunts him all the night; It melts his heart, it makes him weep For wonder, worship, and delight. Coventry Patmore.

IN THE OVER-ARCHING GROVES.

AT morn, as if beneath a galaxy

Of over-arching groves in blossoms white, Where all was od❜rous scent and harmony, And gladness to the heart, nerve, ear, and sight:

There, if, O gentle love, I read aright The utterance that seal'd thy sacred bond,

'Twas listening to these accents of delight, She hid upon his breast those eyes, beyond Expression's power to paint, all languishingly fond.

"Flower of my life, so lovely and so lone!

Whom I would rather in this desert meet, Scorning and scorn'd by Fortune's power, than

Than grandeur's most magnificent saloon-
While, here and there, a solitary star
Flush'd in the dark'ning firmament of June ;—
Never did the Hymenean moon

A Paradise of hearts more sacred sway!
O Love! in such a wilderness as this,
Where transport and security entwine,

Here is the empire of thy perfect bliss,
And here thou art a god indeed divine;
Here shall no forms abridge, no hours con-
fine

The views, the walks, that boundless joy inspire!

Roll on, ye days of raptured influence, shine!
Nor, blind with ecstasy's celestial fire,
Shall love behold the spark of earth-born
time expire.

Thomas Campbell.