soil, swept forth a numerous train,
Horned, or cloven-footed, fierce, or tame,
While, mixed with song, the sound of countless wings,
His rescued prisoners, fanned the ambient air.

The sun drew near his setting, clothed in gold,
But on the Patriarch, ere from prayer he rose,
A darkly-cinctured cloud chill tears had wept,
And rain-drops lay upon his silver hairs.
Then burst an arch of wondrous radiance forth,
Spanning the vaulted skies. Its mystic scroll
Proclaimed the amnesty that pitying Heaven
Granted to earth, all desolate and void.
Oh signet-ring, with which the Almighty sealed
His treaty with the remnant of the clay
That shrank before him, to remotest time
Stamp wisdom on the souls that turn to thee.
Unswerving teacher, who four thousand years
Hast ne'er withheld thy lesson, but unfurled
As shower and sunbeam bade, thy glorious scroll,--
Oft, 'mid the summer's day, I musing sit
At my lone casement, to be taught of thee.
Born of the tear-drop and the smile, methinks,
Thou hast affinity with man, for such
His elements, and pilgrimage below.
Our span of strength and beauty fades like thine,
Yet stays its fabric on eternal truth
And boundless mercy.
The wild floods may come--
The everlasting fountains burst their bounds--
The exploring dove without a leaf return--
Yea, the fires glow that melt the solid rock,
And earth be wrecked: _What then?_--be still, my soul,
Enter thine Ark--God's promise cannot fail--
For surely as yon rainbow tints the cloud,
His truth, thine Ararat, will shelter thee.

SPIRIT-YEARNINGS FOR LOVE.

BY MRS. H. MARION WARD.

Love me, darling, love me, for my wild and wayward heart,
Like Noah's dove in search of rest, will hover where thou art;
Will linger round thee, like a spell, till by thy hand caressed,
It folds its weary, care-worn wings, to nestle on thy breast.

Love me, darling, love me! When my soul was sick with strife,
Thy soothing words have been the sun that warmed it into life;
Thy breath called forth the passion-flowers, that slumbered
'neath the ice
Of self-distrust, and now their balm makes earth a _Paradise_.

Love me, darling, love me! Let thy dreams be all of _me_!
Let waking thoughts be round my path, as mine will cling to thee!
But if--