ie Welt, waere denn Rom auch nicht Rom.--GOETHE:
_Elegy I_.

"Maytide in Rome! The air 's a mist of gold,
In rainbow colors are the fountains springing,
The streets are like a garden to behold,
And in my heart a choir of birds are singing.
Haste to thy window, love: I wait for thee.
High o'er the narrow lane our glance may meet,
Our stretched hands all but clasp. Hither to me,
And make the glory of the hour complete.

"No sound, no sign! The bowed blinds are not stirred.
I dare not cry, lest from the common street
Some passing idler catch one sacred word
That's dedicate to her. How may I greet
My love to-day? how may I lure her near?
Ah! I will write my message on her wall
In living sunshine. She shall see and hear:
The silent fire of heaven shall sound my call."

He draws his casement: on the glittering glass
A captured sunbeam flashes sudden flame:
Between her blinds demure he makes it pass:
Its joyous radiance tells her whence it came.
She feels its presence like a fiery kiss;
Mantling her face leaps up the maiden's blood;
She flies to greet him. Oh immortal bliss!
For ever thus is old Rome's youth renewed.

EMMA LAZARUS.

OUR MONTHLY GOSSIP.

POE AND MRS. WHITMAN.

Burns's Highland Mary, Petrarch's Laura, and other real and imaginary
loves of the poets, have been immortalized in song, but we doubt whether
any of the numerous objects of poetical adoration were more worthy of
honor than Mrs. Sarah Helen Whitman, the friend and defender of Edgar A.
Poe. That he should have inspired so deep and lasting a love in the heart
of so true and pure a woman would alone prove that he was not the social
pariah his vindictive enemies have held up to the world's wonder and
detestation. The poet's love for Mrs. Whitman was the one gleam of hope
that cheered the last sad years of his life. His letters to her breathed
the most passionate devotion and the most enthusiastic admiration. One
eloquent extract from his love-letters to Mrs. Whitman will suffice. In
response to a passage in one of her letters in which she says, "How often
have I heard men, and even women, say of you, 'He has great intellectual
power, but no principle, no moral sense'!" he exclaims: "I love you too
truly ever to have offered you my hand, ever to have sought