With a carol and catch the May came in
  With her wonderful way—­
And I saucily chucked her under the chin,
And tuned me the strings of my violin—­
  And was glad for a day.

FRANCIS CHARLES MCDONALD.
Nassau Literary Monthly.

Yesterday.

Thou art to me like all the days—­
  They ebb and flow with punctual tides,
Leave driftwood—­wreckage on the sands,
  Perhaps a shell besides;
Swift, incommunicable, vast,
They poise—­then perish in the past.

And yet I have not all forgot
  Those years when every day seemed long,
A separate age of joys and play,
  Of wonder-tales and song;
I marvel, Yesterday, to know
  Thou still art childhood’s Long Ago!

FREDERIC LAWRENCE KNOWLES.
Harvard Advocate.

The Last Word.

Life is a boat that is drifting,
      Riding high, rocking low,
    While the tide turns. 
Love is the sands that are shifting
  In and out, to and fro,
    While the tide turns,

Let the boat drift, no oar to lift,
  Clear sky above, calm sea below,
    Till the tide turns. 
Dream on the shore, wander it o’er;
  Gold gleam the sands ’neath the sun’s glow. 
    Till the tide turns.

Time enough, love, to be lifting
  ’Gainst the waves, then, thy oar
    When the tide turns. 
Dreams are sweet, love, e’er the shifting
  Shows how false is the shore,
    When the tide turns.

ELIZABETH SANDERSON.
University of California Magazine.

“Whence all these verses?” you ask me. 
     Would that I knew! 
  “How came they written?”—­You task me,
    Who can tell, who! 
  Stripping a butterfly’s pinions
    To learn how they grew;
  Wasting a violet’s dominions
    To search for the dew;
  Spoiling the odor, the juices,
    The flavor, the hue;
  Rifling the haunts of the Muses,
    For secrets and clue!

  All one can say is:  “Sir Quibbler,
    Once on a time,
  Songs in the heart of the scribbler
    Sang into rhyme;
  Latin lost all its enchantment;
    Logic was worse;
  Joy claimed its rights; the result is
    Just ‘college verse_.’”