The Grange advance. [volume] (Red Wing, Minn.) 1873-1877, 1875-08-18
POETRY.
THE PSALM. BOOK IN THE GARRETT.

HE PSALM BOOK IN THE GARRETT.
BY 8. F. TAYLOR.
A garnet grows a human thing
With lonely oriental eyes,
10 whom contiding fingers bring
The world in yesterdays disguise.
All, richer far than noontide blaze
The soft grey silence of the air,
As il long years Of ended days
Had garnered all their twilights there.
The heart can see so clear and far
In such place with such light
God counts His heavens star by star,
And rains them down unclouded night.
Where rafters set their cobwebb'd feet
Upon the rugged 0aken ledge,
found flock Of singers sweet,
Like snow bound sparrows in hedge.
In silk of spiders spinning hid,
A long and narrow Psalm buOk Law;
l wrote name upon the lid,
Then brushed the idle dust away
All, dotted tribe with ebon heads
That climb the slender fence along!
AS black as ink, as thick as weeds,
Ye little Africans OF song!
Who wrote upon this page "Forget
Me Not p These cruel leaves of old
Have crushed to death violet
See here its specter's paliid gold.
A penciled whisper during prayer
Is that poor dim and girlish word,
But ah, finger longest where
1t opens otis own accord.
These spotted leaves! How they once basked
Beneath the glance of girlhosd's eyes,
And parted to the gaze unasked,
AS spread the wings of butterflies.
The book tails open where it will
Broad on the page runs Silver Street!
That shining way to lions Hill
Where base and treble used to meet.
Ishake the leaves. They part at Near
Again they strike the good old tune;
The village church is builded here;
The twilight .urns to afternoon.
Old house Of Puritanic wood,
Thro' whose implanted windows streamed
On seats as primitive and rude
As Jacobs pillow when he dreamed.
The white and undiluted day
Thy naked aisle no roses grace
That blossomed at the shuttle's play;
Nor saints distempered bless the place.
Like feudal castles, front to front,
In timbered oak OF Saxon Thor,
To brave the Siege and bear the bl mt
OfBunyan's endless Holy War.
The pulpit and the gallery stand
Between the twain peaceful space,
q mn oY11 o1eor h0p
And girls and Gospel face to taee.
l hear the reverend Elder say,
"Hymn fifty first, long meter singh"
l hear the Psalm books fiuttered play
Like foeks OF sparrows taking wing
Armed with a fork to pitch the tune,
hear the Deacon call ''Dundeer'
And mount as brisk as Bonny Doom
His "ia, sol, la," and scent the key.
He ''trees" the note to sister GRAY:
The old Scotch warbling strains begin;
The base OF Bashan leads the way,
And all the girls fall sweetly in.
How swells the hymn Of heavenly love,
As rise the tides in Fundy's Bay
Till all the air below, above,
Is sweet with song and caraway
A fudge let loose cheers up the place
With base and tenor, alto, air;
The parts strike in with measured grace,
And something sweet is everywhere
As if some warbling brood should build
Of bits OF tunes singing nest.
Each bringing that with which it thrilled
And weaving it with all the rest!
The congregation rise and stand:
Old Hundreds rolling thunder comes
In heavy lrges, slow and grand,
As beats the surf its solemn drums
Now come the times when China's vail
Is blended with the faint perfume
OF whispering Grape and cloudy veil,
That fold within their rustling gloom
Some wounded human mourning-dove,
And fall around some stricken one
With nothing left alive to love
Below the unregarded sum-
And now they sing star in sight,
The blessed Star OF Bethlehem;
And now the air is royal bright
With Coronation's diadem.
They show me spots Of dimpled sod,
They ythe girls Of old are there
Oh, no, they swell the choirs of God;
The dear old Songs are everywherel
MISCELLANY.
THE METRIC SYSTEM
An import ant and vigorous movement
has lately been made throughout tn,
United States to bring into more genera
use the European metric or decimall sYs