LEFT UPON MY DESK WHILE I WAS AT A FUNERAL. He brought these violets yester eve, While I was with the dead, And when I hither came to grieve, To me they meekly said— “Let not thy gentle heart-founts flow For her who is at rest, But joy and sing for all who go To sit among the Blest. “Weep for thyself, and not for her, Child of melodious Grief! And pray thy angels, hovering near, To make Life’s journey brief. “For now we hear thy spirit beat With bleeding plumes its grate, And treading with impatient feet, Like one that could not wait. “Like one who, pale ’mid dungeon gloom, Paces his scanty floor, Awaiting till the jailer come To ope his prison-door!” E. ANNA LEWIS. * * * * * [Illustration: Painted by J. Martin THE DESTRUCTION OF SODOM AND GOMORRAH.] * * * * * THE DESTRUCTION OF SODOM. [WITH A STEEL ENGRAVING.] BY MARGARET JUNKIN. The fair, broad plains of Jordan, rich with all Their wealth of summer fruitage, stretched themselves Beneath the orient day. The haunting mists Still folded to their bosoms the hushed streams, O’er which they had kept night-watch. Flocks and herds Dotting the green, fresh pastures stirless lay, While shepherds slept beside them. Peacefully The morning twilight slowly raised its lids On the devoted city, quiet now, With its wild midnight orgies overworn— As from its gate a little band stole forth With fearful footsteps, and affrighted gaze Turned ever upward to the clear, deep heavens, Where all the stars were fading into day. A light, irradiate as the astral glow Of planetary lustre, marked the brows Of those who guided them—betokening Angelic nature, as in the quick haste Of their divine commission fast they urged The trembling lingerers. They pressed the speed Of the old man, bewildered and amazed By weakening terror, and they caught the hands Which the distracted mother madly wrung, To think upon her children left behind, ’Mid the doomed multitude, and drew her on With gentle violence: they cheered the flight Of the twain daughters, who, aghast with fear, Were fain to lay their foreheads in the dust, In palsied helplessness. With the sweet power Of angel eloquence—with sympathies That yearned above their poor humanity In Christ-like tenderness, they hasted still Their lagging steps. “Escape ye, for your lives Look not behind you! neither tarry ye In all the verdant plain:—Escape, escape Safe to the mountain, lest ye be consumed:”