With Love he fills the Spring-time air; My song goes straight to one who stands— The songs within my breast that stir Oh, yon's the way to Arcady, To Arcady, to Arcady; Oh, yon's the way to Arcady, Where all the leaves are merry. John Burroughes WAITING. Serene, I fold my hands and wait, I stay my haste, I make delays, For what avails this eager pace? I stand amid the eternal ways, And what is mine shall know my face. Asleep, awake, by night or day, The friends I seek are seeking me; No wind can drive my bark astray, What matter if I stand alone? I wait with joy the coming years; My heart shall reap where it has sown, And garner up its fruit of tears. The waters know their own and draw The brook that springs in yonder height; So flows the good with equal law Unto the soul of pure delight. The stars come nightly to the sky; Nor time, nor space, nor deep, nor high, WmAllen Butter THE INCOGNITA OF RAPHAEL. [The portrait to which the following verses refer is in the Pitti Palace, at Florence.] Long has the summer sunlight shone Fairer for this! no shadows cast In this bright moment matters not. No record of her high descent There needs, nor memory of her name; Enough that Raphael's colors blent To give her features deathly fame! 'Twas his anointing hand that set The crown of beauty on her brow; Still lives its early radiance yet, As at the earliest, even now 'Tis not the ecstasy that glows In all the rapt Cecilia's grace; Nor yet the holy, calm repose He painted on the Virgin's face. Less of the heavens, and more of earth, What mortal thoughts, and cares, and dreams, What mockery of the painted glow May shade the secret soul within; What griefs from passion's overflow, What shame that follows after sin! Yet calm as heaven's serenest dreams In beauty's lofty trust secure. And who has strayed, by happy chance, Through all those grand and pictured halls, Nor felt the magic of her glance, As when a voice of music falls? Not soon shall I forget the day, Sweet day, in spring's unclouded time, While on the glowing canvas lay The light of that delicious clime; |