“HELEN’S TOWER.” Who hears of Helen’s Tower, may dream, perchance, How the Greek Beauty from the Scæan Gate Gazed on old friends unanimous in hate, Death-doom’d because of her fair countenance. Hearts would leap otherwise at thy advance, Lady, to whom this Tower is consecrate! Like hers, thy face once made all eyes elate, Yet, unlike hers, was blessed by every glance. The Tower of Hate is outworn, far and strange; A transitory shame of long ago, It dies into the sand from which it sprang; But thine, Love’s rock-built Tower, shall fear no change; God’s self laid stable earth’s foundation so, When all the morning stars together sang. —_Robert Browning._ * * * * * The traces of human deeds fade swiftly away from the sun-lighted earth, as the transient shade of thought from the brow, but nothing is lost and dissipated, which the rolling hours, replete with secrets, have received into their dark creative bosom. Time is a blooming field; nature is ever teeming with life, and all is seed, and all is fruit.—_Schiller._ MENDELSSOHN’S GRAVE AND HUMBOLDT’S HOME. By the Author of “German-American Housekeeping,” etc. I wish this article could be accompanied by a pen and ink sketch made on the spot of Mendelssohn’s grave and that of his sister Fanny. The simplicity of it would surprise you, as it astonished me, on one Sunday afternoon when, in company with a friend, I wandered in search of the resting place of him whose songs need no words. We had both imagined some lofty monument would mark the spot, and that in order to find it, it would only be necessary to inquire of some one in the vicinity. Pursuing this plan, to our utter amazement we only received an ignorant stare from plebeian and patrician. Finally being told by an old gentleman, “if we would go beyond the Canal-strasse in the direction of the Belle-alliance Platz down the Schöneberger Ufer through a narrow street,” we would come to a gate opening into a cemetery, which we must pass through, before reaching a smaller cemetery, in which Mendelssohn was buried. After many efforts we roused the old porter who kept the key to the latter gate. We walked rapidly in, expecting to see something in monumental art worthy of the name, but the artless old porter pointed to a grave in the corner and there, overshadowed by some trees, stood the plain slabs with the names of Felix, Fanny and August Mendelssohn.