of the Acropolis. If you turn this way you see at the foot of Hymettus a burial ground with its cypresses, and a funeral procession is going in. Here and there you see what was once a Turkish mosque, with its peculiar round and caplike roof; it is perhaps now an Athenian schoolhouse.

All this I pointed out, as well as I could, to Steenie. Needless to say that I did not indulge in any raptures or even any enthusiasm to him. It is almost an unlucky thing for a man to be really in love with the Parthenon, as I am; for it seems so like affectation-so like going into rapture where rapture is the conventional thing. I have a friend who says it is a positive trouble to him that he can not help admiring Shakspere beyond all other poets.

If any foolish person-some girl, perhaps -asks him what poet he most admires, and he has to answer, "Shakspere," how can she help thinking that he is only saying he admires Shakspere because everybody ought to admire Shakspere? I try to keep my admiration for the Parthenon well in order. I have even once, when asked for my opinion by a young lady, had art enough to say that on the whole I thought the Parthenon very nice. I was rewarded for this judicious self-restraint by obtaining from her a frank and honest reply. She said she didn't care much about it.

A crop' o lis, the citadel of Athens. Ep'i rote, inhabitant of Epirus. font, basin for holy water.

fus ta nel' la, a short skirt of white cot

ton or linen, very full and starched, worn by modern Greek men.

gal lant', a chivalrous man.

Hy met' tus, mountain range in Greece,
famed for its honey.

I lis' sus, ancient dried-up river in Greece.
Kar' nak, site of Thebes.

shard, a fragment of an earthen vessel,
or the like.

NATURE'S SADNESS.

ABRAM J. RYAN.

Go down where the wavelets are kissing the shore, And ask of them why do they sigh;

The poets have asked them a thousand times o'er, But they're kissing the shore as they kissed it before,

And they're sighing to-day, and they'll sigh ever

more.

Ask them what ails them: they will not reply, But they'll sigh on forever and never tell why. Why does your poetry sound like a sigh?

The waves will not answer you; neither shall I.

Go stand on the beach of the blue boundless deep,
When the night stars are gleaming on high,
And hear how the billows are moaning in sleep,
On the low-lying strand by the surge-beaten steep;
They're moaning forever wherever they sweep.

Ask them what ails them: they never reply;
They moan, and so sadly, but will not tell why.
Why does your poetry sound like a sigh?
The waves will not answer you; neither shall I.

Go list to the breeze at the waning of day,

When it passes and murmurs "Good-by."

The dear little breeze-how it wishes to stay Where the flowers are in bloom, where the singing birds play!

How it sighs when it flies on its wearisome way! Ask it what ails it: it will not reply;

Its voice is a sad one, it never told why.

Why does your poetry sound like a sigh?

The breeze will not answer you; neither shall I.

Go watch the wild blasts as they spring from their lair,

When the shout of the storm rends the sky; They rush o'er the earth and they ride thro' the

air,

And they blight with their breath all the lovely and fair,

And they groan like the ghosts in the "land of despair."

Ask them what ails them: they never reply;
Their voices are mournful, they will not tell why.
Why does your poetry sound like a sigh?
The blasts will not answer you; neither shall I.

Go stand on the rivulet's lily-fringed side,

Or list where the rivers rush by;

The streamlets which forest trees shadow and hide, And the rivers that roll in their oceanward tide, Are moaning forever wherever they glide.

Ask them what ails them: they will not reply; On-sad-voiced-they flow, but they never tell why.

Why does your poetry sound like a sigh? Earth's streams will not answer you; neither shall I.

Go list to the voices of air, earth, and sea,

And the voices that sound in the sky;

Their songs may be joyful to some, but to me There's a sigh in each chord and a sigh in each key,

And thousands of sighs swell their grand melody. Ask them what ails them: they will not reply; They sigh-sigh forever-but never tell why. Why does your poetry sound like a sigh? Their lips will not answer you; neither shall I. lair, resting-place of a wild beast.

list, poetic form of "listen."

AN ENGLISH COUNTRY SCENE.

WILLIAM BLACK.

It was as yet early morning, and the level sunshine spread a golden hue over the eastward-looking branches of the great elms, and threw long shadows on the greensward of the park. Far away the world lay all asleep, though the kindling light of the new day was shining on the green plains, and on the white hawthorns, and on this or that gray house, remotely visible among the trees. What surroundings could be fitter for Lady Sylvia, a young English girl, than this English-looking landscape?

Down below, the lake lay still; there was not a breath of wind to break the reflections of the trees on the glassy surface. But she was not quite alone in this silent and sleeping world. Her friends and companions, the birds, had been up before her. She could hear the twittering of the young starlings in their nests, as their parents came and went carrying food, and hear the loud and joyful "tirr-a-wee, tirra-wee, prooit, tweet!" of the thrushes, the low cooing of the wood-pigeons, and the soft call of the cuckoo. Swallows circled over the bosom of the lake. Blackbirds were eagerly but cautiously at work, with their

short, spasmodic trippings, on the lawn. A robin, perched on the iron railing, eyed her curiously, and seemed more disposed to approach than to retreat.

She carried a small basket, with which the robin was doubtless familiar, and now she opened it and began to scatter handfuls of crumbs on the gravel. A multitude of sparrows, hitherto invisible, seemed to spring into life. The robin descended from his perch. But she did not wait to see how her bounties were shared; she had work farther on.

Southward, just beyond the park she was in, there was a wilderness of sandy heath and a dark-green common, now all ablaze with gorse and broom; black pine woods high up at the horizon, and a long, yellow, and dusty road apparently leading nowhere, for there was no trace of town or village as far as the eye could see.

It was in this latter direction that young Lady Sylvia now turned her steps. She passed through some dense shrubberies — the blackbirds shooting away through the laurel-bushes - until she came to an open space at the edge of a wood where there was a spacious dell. Here the sunlight fell in broad patches on a tangled wilderness of wild flowersgreat masses of blue hyacinths, and white starwort, and crimson campion, and purple ground ivy. She stayed a minute to gather a small bouquet, which she placed in her dress, but she did not pluck two snow-white and waxen hyacinths, for she had watched these strangers ever since she had noticed that the flowers promised to be white.

She went on again. Now she was in a sloping glade, among young larches and beeches, with with