LINES TO A WIFE,

AFTER A LONG ILLNESS.

I SAID I would love thee in want or in wealth, Through cloud or through sunshine, in sickness or

health;

And fear not, my love, when thy spirits are weak,
The troth I have plighted I never will break.

Aye, sickness-but sickness it touches the heart, With a feeling, where how many feelings have part! There's a magic in soothing the wearisome hour, Pity rears up the bud, and hope looks for the flower.

The rose smells as sweetly in sunshine and air,
But the greenhouse has all our affection and care;
The lark sings as nobly when soaring above,
But the bird that we nurse is the bird that we love!

I have loved thee in sickness-I'll love thee in health; And if want be our portion, why love be our wealth; Thy comfort in sorrow, thy stay when most weak, The troth I have plighted I never will break!

CORNELIUS NEALE.

TO A WIFE

ON HER BIRTHDAY.

THOUGH Scarce one sun has deigned to shine,
My Susan! through this day so drear,
Yet, save the day that made thee mine,
To me the brightest of the year!

This day first saw those eyes so blue
Their fascinating beams display,
Blest day! to come with rapture new,
Yet never steal a charm away!

THE late, false love, that worldlings learn,

When hearts are hard, and thoughts are stern,
And feelings dull, and custom's rule
Omnipotent, that love may cool,

And waste, and change; but this, which flings
Round the young soul its tendril rings,
Strengthens their growth and grasp
with years;
Till habits, pleasures, hopes, smiles, tears,
All modes of thinking, feeling, seeing,
Of two congenial spirits blend
In one inseparable being.

AND what object can be so dear to a man as the wife of his youth? of her who first drew into one mighty and exquisite feeling all the sympathies of his heart? of her with whom he passed the delightful season of virtuous courtship? of her who inspired him with all the liveliness and enjoyment of hope? of her who first made him sensible of all the endearments of domestic bliss? of her who so often leaned on his arm, in his walks to the house of God, and in the journey of life?

And should infirmities more suddenly or more slowly begin to appear, then is the time for evincing and displaying a more grateful and unselfish affection. Has she not always been thy ministering spirit? has not thy happiness been dearer to her than her own? O then follow a divine example-"I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown."

JAY.

TEN YEARS AGO.

TEN years ago, ten years ago,

Life was to us a fairy scene,
And the keen blasts of worldly woe

Had seared not then its pathway green;
Youth and its thousand dreams were ours,
Feelings we ne'er can know again,
Unwithered hopes, unwasted powers,
And frames unworn by mortal pain ;
Such was the bright and genial glow
Of life with us, ten years ago!

Time has not blanched a single hair
That clusters round thy forehead now,
Nor hath the cankering touch of care
Left even one furrow on my brow;
Thine eyes are blue as when we met

In love's deep truth in earlier years;
Thy cheek of rose is blooming yet,

Though sometimes stained with secret tears;