My lowly home was lofty-crowned,
     With three sweet budding girls;
Our sacred marriage-ring set round
     With darling wee love-pearls.
One jewel from the ring is gone !
One fills a grave in Warriston.

We bore her beauty in our breast,
     As heaven bears the dawn;
We brooded over her dear nest,
     With hearts still closer drawn,
That thrilled and listened, watch'd and throbbed,
And strayed not, yet the nest was robbed.

"Stay yet a little while, beloved!"
     In vain our prayerful breath,
Across Heaven's lighted window moved
     The shadow of black death.
In vain our hands were stretch'd to save,
There closed the gateways of the grave.

Could my death-vision have darkened up
     In her sweet face, my child!
I scarce should see the bitter cup,
     I could have drunk, and smiled,
Blessing her with my last wrung breath,
Dear angel in my dream of death.

Her memory is like music we
     Have heard some singer sing,
That thrills life thro', and echoingly,
     Our hearts for ever ring.
We try it o'er and o'er again,
But ne'er recal the wondrous strain.

My proud heart like a river runs,
     Lying awake o' nights,
I see her with the shining ones,
     Upon the shining heights;
And a wee angel face will peep
Down, star-like, thro' the veil of sleep,

My yearnings try to get their wings,
     And float me up afar,
As in the dawn the skylark springs
     To reach some distant star,
That all night long swam down to him
In brightness, but at morn grew dim.

She is a spirit of light, that leavens
     The darkness where we wait,
And star-like opens in the heavens
     A little golden gate!
Ah, may we wake and find her near,
When work and sleep are over here.

In some far spring of brighter bloom,
     More life and ampler breath,
My bud hath burst the folding gloom,
     A flower from dusty death.
We wonder will she be much grown,
And how will her new name be known.

I saw her ribboned robe this morn,
     Mine own lost little child;
Wee shoes her tiny feet had worn,
     And then my heart grew wild.
We only trust our hearts to peep
In on them when we want to weep.

But hearts will break, or eyes must weep,
     And so we bend above,
These treasures of old times that keep
     The fragrance of young love.
The harvest field, tho' reap'd and bare,
Hath still a patient gleaner there.

I never think of her sweet eyes,
     In dusty death now dim,
But waters of my heart arise,
     And there they smile and swim.
Forget-me-nots, so blue, so dear,
Swim in the waters of a tear!

How often in the days gone by,
     She lifted her dear head,
And stretch'd wee arms for me to lie
     Down in her little bed,
And cradled in my happy breast,
Was softly carried into rest.

And now when life is sore oppressed,
     And runs with weary wave,
I long to lay me down and rest
    In little Marian's grave;
To smile as peaceful as she smiled,
For I am now the nestling child.

The patient calm that comes with years,
     Hath made us cease to fret;
Tho' often in the sudden tears,
     Dumb hearts will quiver yet!
And each one turns the face, and tries
To hide who looks through parent eyes.

THE UNCOMMERCIAL TRAVELLER.

IN the late high winds I was blown to a great
many places—and indeed, wind or no wind, I
generally have extensive transactions on hand in
the article of Air—but I have not been blown
to any English place lately, and I very seldom
have been blown to any English place in my
life, where I could get anything good to eat and
drink in five minutes, or where, if I sought it,
I was received with a welcome.

This is a curious thing to consider. But
before (stimulated by my own experiences and
the representations of many fellow-travellers of
every uncommercial and commercial degree) I
consider it further, I must utter a passing word
of wonder concerning high winds.

I wonder why metropolitan gales always blow
so hard at Walworth. I cannot imagine what
Walworth has done, to bring such windy punishment
upon itself, as I never fail to find recorded
in the newspapers when the wind has blown at
all hard. Brixton seems to have something on
its conscience; Peckham suffers more than a
virtuous Peckham might be supposed to deserve;
the howling neighbourhood of Deptford figures
largely in the accounts of the ingenious gentlemen
who are out in every wind that blows, and
to whom it is an ill high wind that blows no
good; but, there can hardly be any Walworth
left by this time. It must surely be blown
away. I have read of more chimney-stacks and
house-copings coming down with terrific smashes
at Walworth, and of more sacred edifices being
nearly (not quite) blown out to sea from the
same accursed locality, than I have read of practised
thieves with the appearance and manners of
gentlemen—a popular phenomenon which never
existed on earth out of fiction and a police report.
Again: I wonder why people are always blown
into the Surrey Canal, and into no other piece
of water? Why do people get up early and go