That rested on the strings, and press’d a kiss
     Upon it unforbidden—­and again
     Besought her, that this silent evidence
     That I was not indifferent to her heart,
     Might have the seal of one sweet syllable. 
     I kiss’d the small white fingers as I spoke. 
     And she withdrew them gently, and upraised
     Her forehead from its resting-place, and look’d
     Earnestly on me—­She had been asleep!

LOVE AND AGE.

BY THOMAS LOVE PEACOCK.

     I played with you ’mid cowslips blowing,
     When I was six and you were four;
     When garlands weaving, flower-balls throwing,
     Were pleasures soon to please no more. 
     Through groves and meads, o’er grass and heather,
     With little playmates, to and fro,
     We wandered hand in hand together;
     But that was sixty years ago.

     You grew a lovely roseate maiden. 
     And still our early love was strong;
     Still with no care our days were laden,
     They glided joyously along: 
     And I did love you very dearly,
     How dearly words want power to show;
     I thought your heart was touched as nearly;
     But that was fifty years ago.

     Then other lovers came around you,
     Your beauty grew from year to year,
     And many a splendid circle found you
     The centre of its glittering sphere. 
     I saw you then, first vows forsaking,
     On rank and wealth your hand bestow;’
     Oh, then I thought my heart was breaking,—­
     But that was forty years ago.

     And I lived on, to wed another: 
     No cause she gave me to repine;
     And when I heard you were a mother,
     I did not wish the children mine. 
     My own young flock, in fair progression,
     Made up a pleasant Christmas row: 
     My joy in them was past expression,—­
     But that was thirty years ago.

     You grew a matron plump and comely,
     You dwelt in fashion’s brightest blaze;
     My earthly lot was far more homely;
     But I too had my festal days. 
     No merrier eyes have ever glistened
     Around the hearth-stone’s wintry glow,
     Than when my youngest child was christened,—­
     But that was twenty years ago.

     Time passed.  My eldest girl was married,
     And I am now a grandsire gray! 
     One pet of four years old I’ve carried
     Among the wild-flowered meads to play. 
     In our old fields of childish pleasure,
     Where now, as then, the cowslips blow,
     She fills her basket’s ample measure,—­
     And that is not ten years ago.