Let me tell you this that I'm saving a kiss
And a dear good hugging, too,

For the cousin so fair with the golden hair
And the eyes so brightly blue.

So pray, dear Ann, come if you can,
And bring your dolly dear,

My dollies all, both great and small,

Will make her welcome here."
Wrote Ann to Jane: “I'd come to Maine
And play with you I'm sure;
It would be so good if I only could,

But my papa is too poor.

When his ship gets home
He says I may come;
For that will surely bring

All it can hold of silver and gold,
And clothes and everything."
The years flew on, young maidens

Were Mary Ann and Jane;

Still dwelt the first in Boston town,

The second down in Maine.

grown

And now Jane wrote a perfumed note,

All in a perfumed cover,

And thus it ran: "Do come, dear Ann,
Do come, and bring your lover;
I've a lover, too, so tender and true,

A gallant youth is he;

On a summer night, when the moon shines bright, How charming it will be

To pleasantly walk and pleasantly talk

Way down by the sounding sea."

Wrote Ann to Jane: "That visit to Maine
Must longer yet delay,

My cousin dear, for soon draws near
My happy wedding day.".

More years have flown, much older grown
Were Mary Ann and Jane,

Still dwelt the first in Boston town,

The second down in Maine.

And once again took Jane her pen ; "Dear cousin," now wrote she,

"Won't you come down from Boston town,
And bring your family?

Bring all your girls with their golden curls
And their eyes so heavenly blue;
Bring all your boys with all their noise,
And bring that husband, too.

I've a pretty band that round me stand,
Six girls, my heart's delight;

They're as lovely a set as ever you met,
And all remarkably bright.

There's a kiss, you know, that since long ago,
I've been keeping for you, my dear,
Or have you forgot the first little note
I scribbled and sent you from here?"
Thus Ann did reply: "Alas! how can I
Set forth on my travels, dear Jane?
I've too many to take, yet none can forsake,
So sadly at home must remain.

If your kiss is there still, pray keep it until
You see me come jaunting that way.

I've a loving kiss, too, that's been saving for you
This many and many a day."

Time onward ran, now Jane and Ann

Were old and feeble grown

Life's rapid years, 'mid smiles and tears,

Had swiftly o'er them flown.

Their locks of gray were stroked away

From the worn and wrinkled brow;

Their forms were bent, their years were spent,
They were widowed women now.
Suddenly one day, one winter's day,

Aunt Ann said, "I must go

And see Cousin Jane, who lives in Maine,

66

In spite of wind and snow."

Why, grandma, dear, this time of the year?

Oh! what a foolish thing;

You're far too old to go in the cold,

We pray you wait till spring,

When the skies are clear, and the flowers appear,

And the birds begin to sing.

'Children," said she, " don't hinder me;

When smiling spring comes on,

The flowers may bloom around my tomb,

And I be dead and gone.

I'm old, 'tis true, my days are few,
There lies a reason plain
Against delay, if short my stay,

I must away to Maine,

And let these eyes, these mortal eyes,
Behold my Cousin Jane."

As Aunt Jane sits and quietly knits,
Thinking her childhood o'er,

The latch is stirred, and next is heard

A tapping at the door.

"Come in," she said, and raised her head
To see who might appear;

An aged dame who walked quite lame,
Said, "Cousin, I am here.

I'm here, dear Jane, I've come to Maine
To take that kiss, you know,

The kiss, my dear, kept for me here
Since that long, long ago."

In glad surprise, Aunt Jane replies,
"Why, cousin, can this be you?
But where, oh! where, is the golden hair
And the eyes so brightly blue?"
"And where," Ann said, "are your roses fled,
And your chubby cheeks, I pray?
This I suppose was the little pug nose,
But the dimples, where are they?
And the lover, too, so tender and true,

Who walked by the light of the moon,
And the little band that round did stand,
Are they gone, all gone, so soon?"

They turned their eyes to the darkening skies And the desolate scene below,

As they spoke with tears of their childhood years And the hopes of long ago.

The smiles and tears of buried years

Were smiled and wept again. Thus met at last, a lifetime past, The cousins, Ann and Jane-One of whom lived in Boston town, The other down in Maine.

MORAL COURAGE.

A GREAT deal of talent is lost in the world for the

want of a little courage. The fact is, that to do anything in this world worth doing, we must not stand back shivering and thinking of the cold and the danger, but jump in and scramble through as well as we can. It will not do to be perpetually calculating tasks and adjusting nice chances; it did very well before the flood, where a man could consult his friends upon an intended scheme for a hundred and fifty years, and then live to see its success afterward: but at present, a man waits and doubts and hesitates, and consults his brother and his uncle and particular friends, till one fine day he finds that he is sixty years of age; that he has lost so much time in consulting his first cousin and particular friends, that he has no more time to follow their advice. SYDNEY SMITH.