as those of the musk-deer. The large size
of the blood-discs in the frog family has been
of great convenience to students of physiology,
allowing their movements to be watched
under what microscopists would call a low
power, or one that magnifies a hundred
diameters, or thereabouts, more or less.

STORY OF A GRAVE.

HERE, while yon sunset's golden overflow
Touches the churchyard with its dream of Heaven,
Rest on this grave beneath the solemn glow,
The grave, the garden where my heart hath striven
To plant its hopes, that hence their trailing flowers
Might climb to colour in celestial bowers.

Here sleeps my only son: this grave's sad length
Tells thee that death no dreaming babe beguiled,—
A stately man in stature and in strength,
Only in tenderness to me a child.
How well that tenderness my heart supplied
I knew but by its craving when he died.

But still it feels the thrill of its old joy
When friends rare genius in the babe foretold,
Or said the strange, sweet fancies of the boy,
Rich as red rose-leaves, hid a heart of gold;
And when his life fulfill'd the prophecy,
My dear, dear child, he gave the praise to me.

Ah, Hope's bright name to me seem'd written o'er
Each grave book gather'd from his father's toil,
While greedily I learn'd their ancient lore
To drop it softly on my precious soil.
Hope lighted up the glorious path he tried,
And wise men mark'd his steps, and then he died.

Had I no triumph when great spirits caught
Fire from the kindling of his soul-lit eye?
I, who had seen its first soft glimmering thought
Like a star trembling in a dewy sky,
Watch'd the first rapture of its childish glance
At fairy-tale, and poem, and romance.

Eyes true and clear, as when at morn and even
They fill'd with baby-worship at my knee,—
O, 'twas the earnest of an early heaven.
The Eden-dew of pure simplicity
Upon my pleasant plant was never dried,
God gathered it, and mortals said he died.

I taught him first the beautiful to see,
Folded in flowers, glowing in green leaves;
Touch' d him with moonlight and cloud scenery,
Pour'd the soft purple of still summer eves
Over his fancy in its young fresh glow
But, O! the beauty mirror'd in it now!

He was a poet born, and his last dream
Now sweeps its noble music through the land;
And yet how dear the charmed verses seem,
Penn'd to his mother by his boyish hand.
Love sings his life-song with unbroken pride;
Alas! with this refrain, he died, he died!

And still to me his room is holy ground.
There hang his paintings as in days gone past,
There all his instruments of lovely sound,
His books, one open where he read it last!
And in the window stand his desk and chair:
I sometimes fancy that he too is there.

But I should tell thee, in his spirit's shrine,
Was one to whom his inmost self had grown,
Through whose poor mind he pour'd his thoughts like
wine,
And deem'd their colour'd beauty all her own.
I almost grudged him to that fond young bride,—
O! I repented sorely when he died!

Fondness—it perish'd in the grave's chill air,
Frail as the feathers of a butterfly;
She was so young, so exquisitely fair,
Perhaps 'twas natural her love should die.
She wedded soon, that gave him back to me,
Yet I was jealous for his memory.

And thus his young heroic life was shed,—
His only foe was drowning in his sight,
He saved him, then went weary to his bed,
Nor rose from that triumphant woeful night.
My gallant boy! his virtues high were tried,
Thank God, he flinch'd not, though he therefore died.

His father, 'neath that grief hath fail'd so fast,
Since then, his hair, but not with age, is white;
Mine, at the moment when the spirit pass'd,
Turn'd iron-grey, as with some sudden blight,
When to the silent lips my own I press'd,
And hunger'd for one breath, and felt his rest.

My coming loss God show'd me tenderly.
A little daughter in my heart he set,
Few years before it wept its broken tree.
I saw not in my half-shut violet
How large the mercy its fresh leaves could hide,
Nor felt the gentle warning till he died.

But well I know he died to realise
The holy beauty of his high-wrought dream;
Yea, in my soul, I see his star-like eyes
Bum with some glorious spiritual theme;
Nor think his aspirations high were given
To flutter here and fold their wings in heaven.

To him that marble did his townsmen rear:
And showing whence he caught poetic fire,
See how the grand, serene Archangel there
Casts down the wreath but carries up the lyrej
And I, I planted on the sacred spot
The weeping willow and forget-me-not.

The blessings of the poor fall over it,
And fresh wild flowers from childish fingers rain.:
Here oft his father and his sister sit
With me, and talk him back to us again,
Knowing there is a rest that doth abide,
Where we shall soon forget that he hath died.

THE DEAD SECRET.

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SEVENTH. FORTY
THOUSAND POUNDS.

No popular saying is more commonly
accepted than the maxim which asserts, that
Time is the great consoler; and, probably,
no popular saying more imperfectly expresses
the truth. The work that we must do, the
responsibilities that we must undertake, the
example that we must set to others,—these
are the great consolers, for these apply the
first remedies to the malady of grief. Time
possesses nothing but the negative virtue of
helping it to wear itself out. Who that has
observed at all, has not perceived that those