As for Dick, there is every reason to believe that this coming Christmas there will be two or three glad hearts travelling around in company with two or three rough, ragged, shaggy boys; that he will carve his own Christmas turkey at his own, own table; and that there will be a _couleur de Rose_ over all his future life. ---------- {197} Our Lady's Easter. I. She knelt, expectant, through the night: For He had promised. In her face The pure soul beaming, full of grace, But sorrow-tranced--a frozen light. But, ere her eastward lattice caught The glimmer of the breaking day, No more in that sweet garden lay The buried picture of her thought. The sealed stone shut a void, and lo! The Mother and the Son had met! For her a day should never set Had burst upon the night of woe. In sudden glory stood He there, And gently raised her to his breast: And on his heart, in perfect rest, She poured her own--a voiceless prayer. Enough for her that he has died, And lives, to die again no more: The foe despoiled, the combat o'er, The Victor crowned and glorified. {198} II. What song of seraphim shall tell My joy to-day, my blissful queen? Yet truly not in vain, I ween, Our earthly alleluias swell. It is but just that we should thus Our Jesus' triumph share with thee. For us he died, to set us free. Thou owest him risen, then, to us. But thou, sweet Mother, grant us more Than here to join the festive strain: To hymn, but never know, our gain Were ten times loss for once before. Thy faithful children let us be. Entreat thy Son, that he may give The wisdom to our hearts to live In his, the risen life, with thee. For so, amid the onward years, This feast shall bring us strength renewed; To pass secure, o'er self subdued, To Easter in the sinless spheres. ------- {199} Two Months In Spain During The Late Revolution. September 9, 1868. To-day, while they are yet celebrating the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, we enter Spain, that mysterious world behind the Pyrenees, so different from all others, and of which we know so little! To-day is also the anniversary of my birthday into the Catholic Church, and now it is my birthday into Catholic Spain! "La tierra de Maria Santisima."