stranger, arose the question to whom the paternity
should be assigned. Upon this delicate
subject medicine and law exhausted their
science in vain. After much expense and
litigation, an appeal was made to parliament.
Parliament got out of the difficulty by decreeing
that the boy should bear the names of both the
contending sires, and receive the united inheritance.
Who can deny, after this, that a child
may have two legal fathers, and find it much to
his advantage?

TWO SPIRITS OF SONG.
I.
Two spirits sat beside me
   In the silence of the night,
Luminous each and lovely
   In a haze of roseate light:
One azure-eyed and mild,
   With hair like the burst of morn,
And one with raven tresses,
   And looks that scorch'd with scorn,
And yet with gleams of pity
   To comfort the forlorn.

II.
And the one blue-eyed said,
   "Poet, who singest to the crowd,
Sing high and ever higher,
   Sing jubilant and loud,
In the highways and the byways,
   In the forest and the mart,
The song of hope and gladness,
   To cheer the poor man's heart;
And prove that Faith is Fortune,
   And Love the better part.

III.
"Sing joyously! sing ever!
   Sing all that's fresh and fair.
Sing fountains in the desert!
   Sing healing in the air!
Sing light that sleeps in darkness !
   Sing Hope that dwells in doubt!
Sing God, the great All-comforter,
   Who guides us in and out,
And, with eternal beauty,
   Enswathes us round about.

IV.
"Sing cheerily, sing ever,
   That, if the world be bad,
It teems with joys and duties
   To make the good man glad;
The joys of true affection,
   The duties bravely met,
That grow to pleasures daily.
   And shine like diamonds set
In many-tinted lustre
   On Virtue's coronet.

V.
" Sing joyously, sing ever,
   That Right which seems to fall
Rises again in glory,
   And triumphs over all;
That mists may hide, but cannot
   Destroy, the light of day;
That, though the Noon be clouded,
   'Tis Noon though all gainsay;
That Wrong is for the moment,
   And Right for ever and aye!"

VI.
"Not such," said the other spirit,
   "Be the burden of thy song!
Lift up thy voice, O Poet!
   And sound it loud and long,
To stir the nation's pulses,
   And warn both high and low,
Of the day of desolation
   That cometh sure, if slow—
When the storm shall overtake them,
   And toss them to and fro.

VII.
"Arouse the slumbering people
   With words of living flame,
And touch their hearts, grown callous,
   Till their cheeks burn red with shame;
Speak out, clear-forth, to the vicious,
   The ignorant and the base;
Tell them to look around them,
   And not to the highest place,
If they'd shun the wrath of God,
   And the lightnings of His face.

VIII.
"Tell them, if they are vile,
   They court the oppressor's sword,
To smite, and not to spare them,
   In the judgments of the Lord;
That Freedom, high and holy,
  And worthy of the state,
Rewards no sordid nation,
   Where the little and the great
Are worshippers of money,
   And love it early and late—

IX.
"Love it beyond their honour,
   Love it beyond the law,
And cling to it, and bend to it,
   With deep unspeakable awe;
And think no man so lowly
   As he of noblest mould,
Who values truth and virtue
   Above his neighbour's gold,
Nor cares, if independent,
   For the hunger or the cold.

X.
"Ay—tell the world's high teachers,
   Who jest, and jibe, and jeer,
And scoff in their paltry fashion
   At all which men revere,
That realms are ripe and rotten,
   And fester to decay,
When the cynic sneer and laughter
   Of creatures such as they
Usurp the place of wisdom,
   And no man says them, nay.

XI.
"When the Hero and the Prophet,
   The Poet and the Sage,
Are fools in the worldly wisdom
   Of a gross and carnal age;
When men go grubbing money,
   And think of nought beside,
And women sell their beauty,
   And none will be a bride,
Unless for ostentation
   And the trappings of her pride.

XII.
"In time like this, O Poet,
  Why dally with thy power,