I sometimes dream their pleasant smiles Their tones of love I faintly hear -Park Benjamin. STANZAS FROM "THE FOURTH IN OREGON." The grass is green on Bunker Hill, Aye, wise and great was Washington, Aye, wise and good was Washington. He wrought the fabled fleece of gold -Miller. (Permission of the author, Whitaker & Ray-Wiggin Co., Publishers.) THE DAFFODILS. I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high o'er vales and hills, A host of golden daffodils, Continuous as the stars that shine The waves beside them danced, but they In such a jocund company; I gazed, and gazed, but little thought For oft when on my couch I lie, Which is the bliss of solitude; And then my heart with pleasure fills, -Wordsworth. CALIFORNIA POPPY. The golden poppy is God's gold, The gold that lifts, nor weighs us down, What beggar has not gold to burn! -Miller. (Permission of the author, Whitaker & Ray-Wiggin Co., Publishers.) IS IT WORTH WHILE? Is it worth while that we jostle a brother God pity us all as we jostle each other; God pity us all for the triumphs we feel When a fellow goes down; poor, heart-broken brother, Pierced to the heart; words are keener than steel, And mightier far for woe or for weal. Were it not well in this brief little journey, Look at the roses saluting each other; Look at the herds all at peace on the plainMan, and man only, makes war on his brother, And dotes in his heart on his peril and painShamed by the brutes that go down on the plain. Why should we envy a moment of pleasure Some poor fellow-mortal has wrung from it all? Oh! could you look into life's broken measureLook at the dregs-at the wormwood and gallLook at his heart hung with crape like a pall Look at the skeletons down by his hearthstone- (Permission of the author, Whitaker & Ray-Wiggin Co., Publishers.) THE WORLD'S WANDERERS. In what cavern of the night Tell me, moon, thou pale and gray Weary wind, who wanderest On the tree or billow? -Shelley. LINCOLN'S GETTYSBURG SPEECH. Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We are met to dedicate a portion of it as the final resting-place of those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate-we cannot consecrate-we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work that they have thus far so nobly carried on. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to the cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion, that we here highly resolve that the dead shall not have died in vain; that the nation shall, under God, have a new birth of freedom; and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth. THE PRIMROSE OF THE ROCK. The flowers, still faithful to the stems, The stems are faithful to the root, And to the rock the root adheres, Close clings to earth the living rock, So blooms this lonely plant, nor dreads Her annual funeral. -Wordsworth. SONG OF THE OUT O' DOORS. Come with me, O you world-weary, to the haunts of thrush and veery, To the cedar's dim cathedral and the palace of the pine; Let the soul within you capture something of the wildwood rapture, Something of the epic passion of that harmony divine! Down the pathway let us follow through the hemlocks to the hollow, To the woven, vine-wound thickets in the twilight vague and old, While the streamlet winding after is a trail of silver laughter, We shall hear the wild birds' revel in the labyrinth of Tune, And with childhood's clearer vision see the face of God again! (From "At the Shrine of Ray-Wiggin Co. Song." Copyright by Whitaker & |