A TALE OF THE OLDEN TIME.

This pleasant interior scene gives the essence of description and narration in the old man's story to his group of pretty nieces or granddaughters. The original painting is by A. CECCHI, the Italian artist, and well depicts the common ground where age and youth may meet-the romance of the past arousing anticipations of the romance of the future.

DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.

I.

PERSONAL: RULERS; STATESMEN; WARRIORS.

66

TO THE SPRING.

FROM HYMNES OF ASTRÆA, IN ACROSTICKE VERSE."

EARTH now is green, and heaven is blue,
Lively Spring which makes all new,

I olly Spring, doth enter;

Sweet young sun-beams do subdue

A ngry, agèd Winter.

B lasts are mild, and seas are calm,
E very meadow flows with balm,
The Earth wears all her riches;
Harmonious birds sing such a psalm,
A s ear and heart bewitches.

Reserve (sweet Spring) this Nymph of ours, Eternal garlands of thy flowers,

Green garlands never wasting:

In her shall last our state's fair Spring,
Now and for ever flourishing,

As long as Heaven is lasting.

SIR JOHN DAVIES.

TO MARY STUART.

ALL beauty, granted as a boon to earth,
That is, has been, or ever can have birth,
Compared to hers, is void, and Nature's care
Ne'er formed a creature so divinely fair.

In spring amidst the lilies she was born,
And purer tints her peerless face adorn;
And though Adonis' blood the rose may paint,
Beside her bloom the rose's hues are faint:

With all his richest store Love decked her eyes; The Graces each, those daughters of the skies, Strove which should make her to the world most

dear,

And, to attend her, left their native sphere.

The day that was to bear her far away,—
Why was I mortal to behold that day?
O, had I senseless grown, nor heard, nor seen!
Or that my eyes a ceaseless fount had been,
That I might weep, as weep amidst their bowers
The nymphs, when winter winds have cropped
their flowers,

Or when rude torrents the clear streams deform,
Or when the trees are riven by the storm!
Or rather, would that I some bird had been
Still to be near her in each changing scene,
Still on the highest mast to watch all day,
And like a star to mark her vessel's way:
The dangerous billows past, on shore, on sea,
Near that dear face it still were mine to be!

MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS, FORCED TO

SIGN HER ABDICATION.

Her steps to follow and her safety guard,

And deem her lovely looks their best reward?"

-P. RONSARD.

From an engraving after painting by Sir William Allan, R. A.