By your heritage of guilt; By the blood that you have spilt; By the Law that you have broken; By the terrible red token That you bear upon your brow; By the awful sentence spoken And irrevocable vow Which consigns you to a living Death and to the unforgiving Furies who avenge your crime Through the periods of time; By that dread eternal doom Hinted in your future's gloom, As the flames infernal tell Of their power and perfection In their wavering reflection On the battlements of Hell; By the mercy you denied, I condemn your guilty soul In your body to abide, Like a serpent in a hole! THE SUNSET GUN. Off Santa Cruz the western wave Was crimson as with blood: The sun was sinking to his grave Beneath that angry flood. Sir Walter Turnbull, brave and stout, Then shouted, "Ho! lads; run-- The powder and the ball bring out To fire the sunset gun. "That punctual orb did ne'er omit To keep, by land or sea, Its every engagement; it Shall never wait for me." Behold the black-mouthed cannon stand, Ready with charge and prime, The lanyard in the gunner's hand. Sir Walter waits the time. The glowing orb sinks in the sea, And clouds of steam aspire, Then fade, and the horizon's free. Sir Walter thunders: "Fire!" The gunner pulls--the lanyard parts And not a sound ensues. The beating of ten thousand hearts Was heard at Santa Cruz! Off Santa Cruz the western wave Was crimson as with blood; The sun, with visage stern and grave, Came back from out the flood. THE "VIDUATE DAME" 'Tis the widow of Thomas Blythe, And she goeth upon the spree, And red are cheeks of the bystanders For her acts are light and free. In a seven-ounce costume The widow of Thomas Blythe, Y-perched high on the window ledge, The difficult can-can tryeth. Ten constables they essay To bate the dame's halloing. With the widow of Thomas Blythe Their hands are overflowing, And they cry: "Call the National Guard To quell this parlous muss-- For all of the widows of Thomas Blythe Are upon the spree and us!" O long shall the eerie tale be told By that posse's surviving tithe; And with tears bedewed he'll sing this rude Ballàd of the widow of Thomas Blythe. FOUR OF A KIND ROBERT F. MORROW Dear man! although a stranger and a foe To soft affection's humanizing glow; Although untaught how manly hearts may throb With more desires than the desire to rob; Although as void of tenderness as wit, And owning nothing soft but Maurice Schmitt; Although polluted, shunned and in disgrace, You fill me with a passion to embrace! Attentive to your look, your smile, your beck, I watch and wait to fall upon your neck. Lord of my love, and idol of my hope, You are my Valentine, and I'm A ROPE. ALFRED CLARKE JR.