ery heart of youth.

What sought they thus afar?
Bright jewels of the mine?
The wealth of seas? the spoils of war?--
No--'twas a faith's pure shrine.

Yes, call it holy ground,
Which first their brave feet trod!
They have left unstain'd what there they found--
Freedom to worship God!

THE VOICE OF SPRING

I COME, I come! ye have called me long,
I come o'er the mountains with light and song;
Ye may trace my step o'er the wakening earth,
By the winds which tell of the violet's birth,
By the primrose stars in the shadowy grass,
By the green leaves opening as I pass.

I have breathed on the South, and the chestnut-flowers
By thousands have burst from the forest-bowers;
And the ancient graves, and the fallen fanes,
Are veiled with wreaths on Italian plains.
--But it is not for me, in my hour of bloom,
To speak of the ruin or the tomb!

I have passed o'er the hills of the stormy North,
And the larch has hung all his tassels forth,
The fisher is out on the sunny sea,
And the rein-deer bounds through the pasture free,
And the pine has a fringe of softer green,
And the moss looks bright where my step has been.

I have sent through the wood-paths a gentle sigh,
And called out each voice of the deep-blue sky,
From the night-bird's lay through the starry time,
In the groves of the soft Hesperian clime,
To the swan's wild note by the Iceland lakes,
When the dark fir-bough into verdure breaks.

From the streams and founts I have loosed the chain:
They are sweeping on to the silvery main,
They are flashing down from the mountain-brows,
They are flinging spray on the forest-boughs,
They are bursting fresh from their sparry caves,
And the earth resounds with the joy of waves.

Come forth, O ye children of gladness, come!
Where the violets lie may now be your home.
Ye of the rose-cheek and dew-bright eye,
And the bounding footstep, to meet me fly,
With the lyre, and the wreath, and the joyous lay,
Come forth to the sunshine,--I may not stay.

Away from the dwellings of care-worn men,
The waters are sparkling in wood and glen;
Away from the chamber and dusky hearth,
The young leaves are dancing in breezy mirth,
Their light stems thrill to the wild-wood strains,
And Youth is abroad in my green domains.

THE HOMES OF ENGLAND

THE stately homes of England,
How beautiful they stand,
Amidst their tall ancestral trees,
O'er all the pleasant land!
The deer across their greensward bound
Through shade and sunny