How many an antler'd deer has sought the fern
   Beneath these monarchs of the leafy glade;
How many cross-bow bolts have struck their stems,
   How many bullets whistled through their shade.

Here have bold outlaws in King Edward's time
   Strung the yew bow, and feather'd arrows red,
While the fat haunch and wine-jug circled round,
   And near them lay the mighty buck scarce dead.

Yes, here King Harry's black-brow'd myrmidons
   Branded and bound the gipsy's sallow race,
And here the Jacobite oft knelt in prayer
   For monarch wandering in some desert place.

And here have wounded troopers cowering hid,
   Waiting the well-known voice and pitying eyes,
And here, with sullen psalms and gloomy prayer,
   The Ironsides have doled their prophecies.

These trees have heard the lover's parting kiss,
  The poacher's curses, and the mourner's sigh,
The children's prattle and—it is for this
   I hold them bound to man in sympathy.

I pity them. 'Tis hard to die in spring,
  When Nature's heart beats quick with hope and love,
When little lilies chime their bells below,
   And nightingales' rich music thrills above.

Twould be a dismal sight in winter time,
  When great boughs snap, and trunks are tempest cleft,
When dead leaves drift across the rainy skies,
   And not a wayside flower of hope is left;—

How mournful now, when sunshine fills the air,
   And drooping hyacinths grow blue and rank,
When echoing cuckoos greet the spring again,
   And violets purple every woodside bank.

Bald, bark'd, and bare, the oak tree's giant limbs
   Soon will strew every path of trodden fern;
Already I can hear the splintering axe,
  And see the woodman's fires that crackling burn.

The old woods pay for many a young heir's faults,
   These giants, centuries long without a fear,
Fall headlong at one single rattling tap
   Of ivory hammer of brisk auctioneer.

TOLD BY A TRAMP.

THIS is a letter from one of the "respectable
men" who slept in the Lambeth labour-shed on
the same night as the "Amateur Casual."  I
discovered him by the simple process of
advertising in the second column of the Times. We
have subsequently had frequent communications
with each other, and I spent a very agreeable
day with my oddly-found friend not long ago.
In reply to my request that he would put on
paper some of the experiences he told me, he
wrote as follows:

Soon after my decline into vagabondage last
summer, I went into Essex; but I will just
relate how the journey came to be contemplated. I
had been lounging about the Parks for two days,
and, as I had not commenced begging then, I
was extremely hungry. In the morning, after
sleeping on the benches in the Mall, another
seedy-looking tramp, who had slept beside me
during the night, commenced a conversation on
appearances generally, remarking that he would
not have been there, only he couldn't get into a
workhouse last night. Then he enumerated a
few good workhouses, mentioning Mount-street
as especially worthy of patronage; he told me,
also, that the food was pretty good. I thought
that I would go that evening and see whether I
couldn't get in. I had a faint notion that
Mount-street was near to Hyde Park, and after
leaning on the railings in Rotten Row, watching
the "rank and fashion" for sometime, I lounged
into South Audley-street, and at the corner of a
street saw a man with a white smock on, of
whom I inquired where Mount-street was? He
told me, and, just as I was leaving, said, with a
sharp movement of his finger, "Want the big
house?" I said that the workhouse was what
I wanted. "Ah, well," he said, "just you look
here, I wouldn't go there. It's a dirty, starving
shop." I wished to know where else I must
go, seeing that I was entirely without funds.
He asked me if I was hungry, and on my replying
in the affirmative, took me into the
Albemarle Arms near, and pulled some bread and
meat out of an oven in the taproom; he also
fetched a pint of beer, and while I was eating
told me a little about himself. He was a farrier,
but knew a better dodge than hard work. He
was always about Grosvenor and Berkeley squares
and held horses, opened cabs, and did a little
cadging when the opportunity presented itself.
The meat I was eating then, had been got from
a servant down the street, and was the remains
of yesterday's dinner. He said that if I was
guided by him I could do a better thing than
going to workhouses. I was curious to know
what the "better thing" was. All the "pins,"
as he termed them, would be full of gentlemen's
servants about nine o'clock that night,
and if I told a good tale I could get plenty of
cash. This I couldn't do, I said. Well, I
might hold cab-horses, and be sure of a penny.
I did hold a few cab-horses, but he was
close by and got the pennies, which he
never failed to expend at the nearest public-
house. At about eight o'clock I proposed that
he should see what food he could get from the
servant girls he had boasted about as being
his friends. The first house we went to in Hill-
street made him lose heart. A liveried foot-
man came up the area steps, and in reply to his
touch of the hat said, "Didn't I tell you before,
that the confectioner's man always came round
for the broken meats at six o'clock?" He
wouldn't go to any other house, and as I could see
he was fast getting drunk, and seeing no
possibility of the "better thing" yet, I left him at
nine o'clock and went towards the workhouse.
They had two spare bunks at Mount-street,
and the porter at the door asked me why
such a chap as I wanted lodging? I was
tidily dressed, and what on earth could I
want there? A pauper took me up to the
casual ward, and on the way said, "We allers
keeps a bed or two empty, a-chance the Bobbies
brings a cove in. We've turned some away to-
night, and you're devilish lucky to be taken in."