Three women walked upon a road,
And the first said airily,
“Of all the trees in all the world
Which is the loving tree?”

The second said, “My eyes have seen
No tree that is not fair;
But the Orange tree is the sweetest tree,
The loving blood is there.”

And the third said, “In the green time
I knew a loving tree
That gave a drink of the blood-red milk,
It was the Mulberry.”

Then the first one said, “Of all the trees
No sweetest can I name;
Ask her who yonder slowly comes—
That woman lean and lame.”

The little one-room schoolhousc among the redwoods

Opened its door, a dozen children ran out

And saw on the narrow road between the dense trees

A persona girl by the long light-colored hair:

The torn brown cloak that she wore might be a man's

Or woman's eitherwalking hastily northward

Among a huddle of sheep. Her thin young face

Seemed joyful, and lighted from inside, and formed

Too finely to be so wind-burnt. As she went forward

One or another of the trotting sheep would turn

The look that thy sweet eyes on mine impress
The pledge thy lips to mine convey,--the kiss,--
He who, like me, hath knowledge sure of this,
Can he in aught beside find happiness?
Removed from thee, friend-sever'd, in distress,
These thoughts I vainly struggle to dismiss:
They still return to that one hour of bliss,
The only one; then tears my grief confess.
But unawares the tear makes haste to dry:
He loves, methinks, e'en to these glades so still,--
And shalt not thou to distant lands extend?
Receive the murmurs of his loving sigh;

Why do I o'er my paper once more bend?
Ask not too closely, dearest one, I pray
For, to speak truth, I've nothing now to say;
Yet to thy hands at length 'twill come, dear friend.
Since I can come not with it, what I send
My undivided heart shall now convey,
With all its joys, hopes, pleasures, pains, to-day:
All this hath no beginning, hath no end.
Henceforward I may ne'er to thee confide
How, far as thought, wish, fancy, will, can reach,
My faithful heart with thine is surely blended.
Thus stood I once enraptured by thy side,

Brown is the hill where the maples grow-
So brown, so calm, so cold and still ;

But the loving leaves creep snug and close,
And warm the feet of my dear old hill.

And they do n't forget the violets small,
Shivering and cold in the damp and wet ;

They cover them up in blankets brown,
Whispering, ' Darlings, we love you yet.'

Down in the hollow amid the ferns,

Their billowy wraps they wreath and roll ;

And they spread a carpet, rich and warm,
To keep the snow from the mouse's hole.

WISE men use days as husbandmen use bees,
And steal rich drops from every pregnant hour;
Others, like wasps on blossomed apple-trees,
Find gall, not honey, in the sweetest flower.

Congratulations for a scene like this!
The olden times are here—these shall be olden
When, years to come, remembering present bliss,
We sigh for past Papyrian dinners golden.

We thank the gods! we call them back to light—
Call back to hoary Egypt for Osiris,
Who first made wine, to join our board to-night,
And drain this loving cup with the Papyrus.

Lord Bateman was a noble lord,
A noble lord of high degree;
He shipped himself all aboard of a ship,
Some foreign country for to see.

He sailed east, he sailed west,
Until he came to famed Turkey,
Where he was taken and put to prison,
Until his life was quite weary.

All in this prison there grew a tree,
O there it grew so stout and strong!
Where he was chained all by the middle,
Until his life was almost gone.

This Turk he had one only daughter,
The fairest my two eyes eer see;

When first my old, old love I knew,
My bosom welled with joy;
My riches at her feet I threw;
I was a love-sick boy!
No terms seemed too extravagant
Upon her to employ -
I used to mope, and sigh, and pant,
Just like a love-sick boy!

But joy incessant palls the sense;
And love unchanged will cloy,
And she became a bore intense
Unto her love-sick boy?
With fitful glimmer burnt my flame,
And I grew cold and coy,
At last, one morning, I became
Another's love-sick boy!

'Twas when the world was in its prime,
When the fresh stars had just begun
Their race of glory and young Time
Told his first birth-days by the sun;
When in the light of Nature's dawn
Rejoicing, men and angels met
On the high hill and sunny lawn,-
Ere sorrow came or Sin had drawn
'Twixt man and heaven her curtain yet!
When earth lay nearer to the skies
Than in these days of crime and woe,
And mortals saw without surprise
In the mid-air angelic eyes
Gazing upon this world below.

Alas! that Passion should profane

Eyes of grey -- a sodden quay,
Driving rain and falling tears,
As the steamer wears to sea
In a parting storm of cheers.
Sing, for Faith and Hope are high --
None so true as you and I --
Sing the Lovers' Litany:
"Love like ours can never die!"

Eyes of black -- a throbbing keel,
Milky foam to left and right;
Whispered converse near the wheel
In the brilliant tropic night.
Cross that rules the Southern Sky!
Stars that sweep and wheel and fly,
Hear the Lovers' Litany:
Love like ours can never die!"