A Christmas Hymn.

It was the calm and silent night!
Seven hundred years and fifty-three
Had Rome been growing up to might,

And now was queen of land and sea.
No sound was heard of clashing wars,—

Peace brooded o'er the hushed domain:
Apollo, Pallas, Jove, and Mars

Held undisturbed their ancient reign,
In the solemn midnight,

Centuries ago.

'T was in the calm and silent night!
The senator of haughty Rome,
Impatient, urged his chariot's flight,
From lordly revel rolling home;
Triumphal arches, gleaming, swell

His breast with thoughts of boundless sway; What recked the Roman what befell

A paltry province far away,
In the solemn midnight,
Centuries ago?

Within that province far away

Went plodding home a weary boor;
A streak of light before him lay,

Fallen through a half-shut stable-door,
Across his path. He passed, for naught
Told what was going on within;
How keen the stars, his only thought-
The air, how calin, and cold, and thin,
In the solemn midnight,
Centuries ago!

Oh, strange indifference! low and high
Drowsed over common joys and cares;

The earth was still, but knew not why;
The world was listening, unawares.
How calm a moment may precede

One that shall thrill the world forever
To that still moment, none would heed,
Man's doom was linked no more to sever,
In the solemn midnight,

Centuries ago!

It is the calm and solemn night!

A thousand bells ring out, and throw
Their joyous peals abroad, and smite

The darkness, charmed and holy now!
The night that erst no name had worn,
To it a happy name is given;
For in that stable lay, new-born,

The peaceful Prince of earth and heaven,
In the solemn midnight,

Centuries ago!

ALFRED DOMETT.

The Ivy Green.

O, A DAINTY plant is the ivy green,

That creepeth o'er ruins old!

Of right choice food are his meals, I ween,

In his cell so lone and cold.

The walls must be crumbled, the stones decayed,

To pleasure his dainty whim;

And the mouldering dust that years have made Is a merry meal for him.

Creeping where no life is seen,

A rare old plant is the ivy green.

Fast he stealeth on, though he wears no wings,

And a stanch old heart has hel

How closely he twineth, how tight he clings
To his friend, the huge oak-tree!
And slyly he traileth along the ground,
And his leaves he gently waves,

And he joyously twines and hugs around
The rich mould of dead men's graves.
Creeping where no life is seen,
A rare old plant is the ivy green.

Whole

ages have fled, and their works decayed,

And nations have scattered been;

But the stout old ivy shall never fade
From its hale and hearty green.
The brave old plant in its lonely days
Shall fatten upon the past;

For the stateliest building man can raise
Is the ivy's food at last.

Creeping where no life is seen,
A rare old plant is the ivy green.

The Polish Boy.

CHARLES DICKENS

WHENCE Come those shrieks so wild and shrill,

That cut, like blades of steel, the air,

Causing the creeping blood to chill

With the sharp cadence of despair?

Again they come, as if a heart

Were cleft in twain by one quick blow,

And every string had voice apart

To utter its peculiar woe.

Whence come they? From yon temple, where

An altar, raised for private prayer,

Now forms the warrior's marble bed

Who Warsaw's gallant armies led.

The dim funereal tapers throw
A holy lustre o'er his brow,
And burnish with their rays of light
The mass of curls that gather bright
Above the haughty brow and eye
Of a young boy that 's kneeling by.

What hand is that, whose icy press

Clings to the dead with death's own grasp, But meets no answering caress?

No thrilling fingers seek its clasp. It is the hand of her whose cry Rang wildly, late, upon the air, When the dead warrior met her eye Outstretched upon the altar there.

With pallid lip and stony brow
She murmurs forth her anguish now.
But hark! the tramp of heavy feet
Is heard along the bloody street;
Nearer and nearer yet they come,
With clanking arms and noiseless drum.
Now whispered curses, low and deep,
Around the holy temple creep;
The gate is burst; a ruffian band
Rush in, and savagely demand,
With brutal voice and oath profane,
The startled boy for exile's chain.

The mother sprang with gesture wild,
And to her bosom clasped her child;
Then, with pale cheek and flashing eye,
Shouted with fearful energy,
"Back, ruffians, back! nor dare to tread
Too near the body of my dead;
Nor touch the living boy; I stand
Between him and your lawless band.

Take me, and bind these arms, these hands, With Russia's heaviest iron bands,

And drag me to Siberia's wild

To perish, if 't will save my child!"

"Peace, woman, peace!" the leader cried,
Tearing the pale boy from her side,
And in his ruffian grasp he bore

His victim to the temple door.

"One moment!" shrieked the mother; "one ! Will land or gold redeem my son? Take heritage, take name, take all,

But leave him free from Russia's thrall! Take these!" and her white arms and hands She stripped of rings and diamond bands,

And tore from braids of long black hair The gems that gleamed like starlight there; Her cross of blazing rubies, last,

Down at the Russian's feet she cast.

He stooped to seize the glittering store;—
Up springing from the marble floor,
The mother, with a cry of joy,

Snatched to her leaping heart the boy.
But no! The Russian's iron grasp
Again undid the mother's clasp.
Forward she fell, with one long cry
Of more than mortal agony.

But the brave child is roused at length,
And, breaking from the Russian's hold,

He stands, a giant in the strength

Of his young spirit, fierce and bold.
Proudly he towers; his flashing eye,
So blue, and yet so bright,
Seems kindled from the eternal sky,
So brilliant is its light.

His curling lips and crimson cheeks
Foretell the thought before he speaks;