Gay groups of happy children there, The old oak and the breathless swing, The shouts of laughter on the air, The chaplets that the young girls bring. All’s gone! except these gushing tears, Sad relics of the joyous past, The shrines that memory uprears To shield the incense from the blast. Some sleep beneath the ocean’s wave, Some ’neath the flowers that loved ones tend, Others have found an early grave Where stranger skies above them bend, And she, the cherished one, she sleeps Beneath the violet-covered earth, Where spring-time’s earliest cloudlet weeps And roses have a dewy birth. Enough, she sleeps—would that my dreams Could rest forever by her side, As peaceful as the morning beams Are pillowed on the sleeping tide. * * * * * THE PRECIOUS REST. BY RICHARD COE, JR. Once on a lovely summer day, I saw a little child at play, While in a garden straying— Till suddenly I heard him say, “I am tired with playing!” Then running to his father he Laid down his head upon his knee, And slept, oh! how contentedly? So life is but a summer day, And man—a little child at play— While through the world a-straying: And often, too, we hear him say, “I am tired with playing!” Till hast’ning to his Father, he Lays down his head upon his knee, And rests, oh! how contentedly! * * * * * WILD-BIRDS OF AMERICA. BY PROFESSOR FROST. [Illustration: THE WHIP-POOR-WILL.]