God throws His shadow Into the gloom; The raindrops have caught it, And break into bloom! His light on Earth's teardrops Gems Bliss on her clouds, His rainbow of color Paints Hope on her shrouds. Tender and lovely, Luminous, fair, Infinite Beauty Is bending through air, Breathing through color, Through Order, through Form, That infinite Love Rules the heart of the storm. Caught in soft meshes, Fractions the light, Gold, green, or ruby, Tremblingly bright. Through the torn chasms Smiles the lost blue-- The wilder the drifting, The deeper the hue. Beauty above us, Beauty around, Clouds, stars gem the heavens, Trees, flowers paint the ground. Rapturous meaning Illumines the whole: God gives us Beauty, For Love is His Soul! High-floating Cirri, Passionless, pure; Wild-piling Cumuli, Never secure; Low-trailing Rain Clouds With rainbow-lit pall-- Softly ye whisper That Love ruleth all! SKETCHES OF AMERICAN LIFE AND SCENERY. II.--THE CATSKILL MOUNTAINS. Who, in ascending the Hudson River, has not watched for the first glimpse of the Catskills, and followed with delight their gradual development of peak and clove, until, near Hudson, they stood fully revealed, flooded with sunshine, flecked with shadows, or crowned by storm-laden clouds? This region is noteworthy, not alone from its beauty and incalculable utility, but also from the associations clustering around it through the pen of poets and writers of romance, the brush of the artist, and the memories of thousands of tourists, who have found health and strength for both body and mind upon its craggy heights or beside its numberless wild and beautiful mountain torrents. It comprises the whole of Greene County, a portion of Delaware, and the neighboring borders of Ulster, Schoharie, and Albany. It truly deserves the appellation of 'many fountained,' giving rise to great rivers, such as the Delaware, and one of the main branches of the Susquehanna, and to manifold smaller watercourses, as the Schoharie, Catskill, and Esopus. Unlike the Highlands of Northern New Jersey and Southern New York, and the region of the Adirondacs, its lakes are few and very small. The best known are the twin lakes near the Mountain House, and Shue's Lake, not far from the summit of Overlook Mountain. These are all at a height, approximately, of two thousand feet above the river, and add greatly to the variety and interest of the landscape in their vicinity.