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DALLYING.

EAR love, I have not ask'd you yet;
Nor heard you, murmuring low
As wood-doves by a rivulet,
Say if it shall be so.

The colour on your cheek, which plays
Like an imprison'd bliss,
To its unworded language, says,
"Speak, and I'll answer 'Yes.'"

See, pluck this flower of wood-sorrel,
And twine it in your hair;

Its woodland grace becomes you well,
And makes my rose more fair.

Oft you sit 'mid the daisies here,

And I lie at your

feet;

Yet day by day goes by ;-I fear

To break a trance so sweet.

As some first autumn tint looks strange,

And wakes a strange regret,

Would your soft "yes" our loving change?— Love, I'll not ask you yet.

THOMAS ASHE.

CHARMIAN.

ON the time when water-lilies shake

Their green and gold on river and lake,

When the cuckoo calls in the heart o' the

heat,

When the Dog-star foams and the shade is sweet; Where cool and fresh the River ran,

I sat by the side of Charmian,

And heard no sound from the world of man.

All was so sweet and still that day!
The rustling shade, the rippling stream,
All life, all breath, dissolved away
Into a golden dream;

Warm and sweet the scented shade
Drowsily caught the breeze and stirred,
Faint and low through the green glade
Came hum of bee and song of bird.
Our hearts were full of drowsy bliss,
And yet we did not clasp nor kiss,
Nor did we break the happy spell

With tender tone or syllable.

D

But to ease our hearts and set thought free We pluckt the flowers of a red Rose-tree, And leaf by leaf, we threw them, Sweet, Into the river at our feet,

And in an indolent delight,

Watched them glide onward, out of sight.

Sweet, had I boldly spoken then,
How might my love have garner'd thee!
But I had left the paths of men,
And sitting yonder dreamily,
Was happiness enough for me!
Seeking no gift of word or kiss,
But looking in' thy face, was bliss!
Plucking the Rose-leaves in a dream,
Watching them glimmer down the stream,
Knowing that Eastern heart of thine
Shared the dim ecstasy of mine!

Then, while we linger'd, cold and gray
Came twilight, chilling soul and sense;
And you arose to go away,

Full of a sweet indifference!

I missed the spell-I watch'd it break,-
And such come never twice to man:

In a less golden hour I spoke,

And did not win thee, Charmian !

For wearily we turned away

Into the world of everyday,

And from thy heart the fancy fled

Like the Rose-leaves on the river shed;
But to me that hour is sweeter far

Than the world and all its treasures are :

Still to sit on so close to thee,
Were happiness enough for me!
Still to sit on in a green nook,

Nor break the spell by word or look!
To reach out happy hands for ever,
To pluck the Rose-leaves, Charmian !
To watch them fade on the gleaming River,
And hear no sound from the world of man!

ROBERT BUCHANAN.

NOT LOVE.

HAVE not, yet I would have loved thee, sweet;
Nor know I wherefore, thou being all thou

art,

The engrafted thought in me throve incomplete,

And grew to summer strength in every part

Of root and leaf, but hath not borne the flower : Love hath refrained his fulness from my heart.

I know no better beauty, none with power

To hold mine eyes through change and change as thine,

Like southern skies that alter with each hour

And yet are changeless, and their calm divine
From light to light hath motionlessly passed
With only different loveliness for sign.

I know no fairer nature, nor where, cast
On the clear mirror of thine own young truth,
The imaged things of heaven lie plainer glassed;

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