Methinks I stand midway between The future and the past, The onward path is dimly seen, Behind me clouds are cast; Why should I seek to pierce that gloom And call the buried host Of haunting memories from the tomb— Each one a tortured ghost? I could not look upon the page, With eloquence o’erfraught, Where, ere my head had grown so sage, My heart its wild will wrought; I could not—would not—ponder now O’er my youth’s wayward madness, Which left no stain on soul or brow, Yet shrouded life in sadness. Ay, let them perish!—from the dream Of Passion’s wasted hour There comes no retrospective gleam, No spectre of the flower: The treasured wealth of Eastern kings Enriched their burial fire, And thus my heart’s most precious things Shall build its funeral pyre. * * * * * UNCLE TOM. BY “SIMON.” CHAPTER I. A strange old man was my Uncle Tom. He was my father’s only and elder brother, and more than all, he was a bachelor; not one of those sour specimens of humanity who are continually railing at everybody and every thing—more especially “the sex”—but a hearty, hale, good-natured gentleman of the old school, straight as a poplar, and his heart had as many green leaves withal. He was still a boy in feeling, though winter had begun to spread its snows over his head. He was far from hating women, though when he talked of them, or thought of them, a look of sadness would sometimes overspread his countenance; and when he saw some fairy phantom that had not yet escaped her “teens,” in the full flush of maiden grace and beauty, old recollections seemed to come over him with a deep and maddening influence. No one ever told me the cause of this temporary dejection, and Uncle Tom seemed unwilling to be questioned concerning it. There needed no questioning. From our cottage, a smooth-worn path led across the fields to the village church-yard, which lay at about a quarter of a mile distant. Passing through a gap in the wall, it wound among the grass-grown hillocks, and stopped abruptly before a small, gray stone, which stood in the corner nearest the church, and on which this simple epitaph was engraved: Mary, æt. 18. This told his whole story; for the small, gray stone was overgrown with lichens and mosses, and I remember the solitary pathway when but a child.