IT is true that there are but few real friends, and it is hard to lose them; but we do not lose them-we rather are in danger of losing ourselves while waiting to follow those we mourn.

FENELON

THY will be done, though in my own undoing.

SIR THOMAS BROWNE

HIGH-SPIRITED friend,

I send nor balms nor cor'sives to your wound

Your fate hath found

A gentler and more agile hand to tend
The cure of that which is but corporal.

BEN JONSON

THE

Departed

HEY are all gone into the world of light!
And I alone sit ling'ring here;

Their very memory is fair and bright,

And my sad thoughts doth clear.

It glows and glitters in my cloudy breast,
Like stars upon some gloomy grove,

Or those faint beams in which this hill is drest
After the sun's remove.

I see them walking in an air of glory,
Whose light doth trample on my days:
My days, which are at best but dull and hoary,
Mere glimmering and decays.

O holy Hope! and high Humility,

High as the heavens above!

These are your walks, and you have show'd them me, To kindle my cold love.

Dear, beauteous Death! the jewel of the Just,

Shining nowhere, but in the dark;

What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust,

Could man outlook that mark!

ROSE AYLMER

He that hath found some fledged bird's nest may know,
At first sight, if the bird be flown;
But what fair well or grove he sings in now,
That is to him unknown.

And yet as Angels in some brighter dreams
Call to the soul, when man doth sleep:
So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted themes,
And into glory peep.

If a star were confined into a tomb,

Her captive flames must needs burn there; But when the hand that lock'd her up gives room, She'll shine through all the sphere.

O Father of eternal life, and all

Created glories under Thee!

Resume Thy spirit from this world of thrall
Into true liberty.

Either disperse these mists, which blot and fill
My perspective still as they pass :

Or else remove me hence unto that hill,
Where I shall need no glass.

A

Rose Aylmer

HENRY VAUGHAN

H, what avails the sceptred race!

Ah, what the form divine!
What every virtue, every grace!
Rose Aylmer, all were thine.

REQUIESCAT

Rose Aylmer, whom these wakeful eyes
May weep, but never see,
A night of memories and sighs
I consecrate to thee.

WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR

STREW

Requiescat

TREW on her roses, roses,
And never a spray of yew.

In quiet she reposes:

Ah! would that I did too.

Her mirth the world required:

She bathed it in smiles of glee.
But her heart was tired, tired,
And now they let her be.

Her life was turning, turning,
In mazes of heat and sound.
But for peace her soul was yearning,
And now peace laps her round.

Her cabin'd, ample Spirit,

It flutter'd and fail'd for breath.

To-night it doth inherit

The vasty hall of Death.

MATTHEW ARNOLD

HERACLITUS

THEY

Heraclitus

HEY told me, Heraclitus, they told me you were dead;

They brought me bitter news to hear and bitter tears to shed.

I wept as I remember'd how often you and I

Had tired the sun with talking and sent him down the sky.

And now that thou art lying, my dear old Carian guest,

A handful of grey ashes, long, long ago at rest,
Still are they pleasant voices, thy nightingales awake;
For Death, he taketh all away, but them he cannot
take.

WILLIAM CORY

I

The Old Familiar Faces

HAVE had playmates, I have had companions,

In my days of childhood, in my joyful schooldays—

All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

I have been laughing, I have been carousing,

Drinking late, sitting late, with my bosom cronies— All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.