Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1876-12-06
Retry.
From Harper's Magazine for December.
AT TWO SCORE.

From Harpers Magazine for December,
AT TWO SCORE.
BY T. D. ALDEIoH.
The leafess branches snap with cold;
The night is still, the winds are laid
And you are sitting, as of old,
Beside my heart stone, heavenly maid
What would have CHANGED me all these years,
As man ard boy, had you not come,
And brought me gifts of smiles and tears
From your Olympian home
''The blackest cloud that ever lowers"
You gang when was most forlorn,
"If we but watch some patient hours
Takes silver edges from the morn.
Thanks for the lesson; thanks for ALL
Not only for ambrosa brought,
But for those drops which fell like gall
Into the cup of thought.
Dear Muse, tits twenty years or more
Since that enchanted, fairy time
When YOU came tapping at my door,
Your reticule stuffed full Of rhyme
What strange things have befalen, indeed
Since then Who has the time to say
What bards have lowered (and gone to seed)-
Immortal for day
We've seen pretonce with Gro IS and crown,
And folly caught in self spun toils
Merit content to pass unknown.
And honor scorning public spoils-
Seen Bottom WELD the critics pen
While Ariel sang in sunlit cloud
Sometimes we wept. and now and then
We could but laugh aloud.
And once We saw-all, day of woe J.
The lurid fires of civil war,
The blue and gray frocks laid arrow,
And many name rise like star
To shine in gplendor evermore
The fiery flood swept hill and plain
But cl ear above the battles roar
Rang slavery's falling chain.
With pilgrim staff and sandal-shocn,
One time we sought the Old-World shrines ;
Saw Venice lying in the moon,
The Jungfrau and the Appenines;
Beheld the Tiber rolling dark.
Rent temples, fanes, and gods austere
In English meadows heard the lark
That charmed her Shakspeare'a ear.
What dreams and visions we have had,
What tempests we have wheathered thro' !
Been rich and poor, and gay and sad,
But never hopeless-thanks to you,
A draught of wat er from the brook,
Or alt Hockheimer--it was one;
Whatever fortune fell we took
Children of shade and sun.
Though lacking gold, we never stopped
To pick it up in all our days;
Though lacking praise, we sometimes dropped
We never asked q soul fer praise.
The exquisite reward of song
Was sung-the self-same thrill and glow
Which to unfolding flowers belong,
And wrens and thrushes know.
tried you once--the day l we'd
Dear Muse, do you remember how
You rose in haste, and turned and fed.
With sudden-knitted, scornful brow
But you relented, smiled, at last
Returned, and, with your tears half dried
"Ah well, she can not take the Past
Though she have all beside !"
What gilt-winged hopes have taken flight,
And dropped like Icarus, in mid.sky
What cloudy days have turned to bright
What sad sweet years have fitted ny
What lips we loved vain memory seeks
What hands are cold that once pressed ours
What lashes rest upon the cheeks
Beneath the SHOWS and flowers!
We would not wish them back again;
The way is rude from here to there
For us the short-lved JOY and pain;
For them the endless rest from care,
The crown, the palm, the deathless youth;
We would not wish them back--ah, no !
And as for us, dear Muse, in truth,
We've but half way to 60.