Brain and fingers of matchless cunning

Patiently planned the strange machine; Framed and balanced, and set it running,

With a living heart in its wheels unseen. Behind the dial, the iron pallet

Counted the seconds, and just below Hung a silver gong, and a brazen mallet For every hour had a brazen blow;

And near, like windrowed leaves in the weather,
Or battle wrecks at a charnel door,

Lay mock men's limbs, all huddled together,
In a shapeless heap, on a marble floor!
And when the dial-hands, creeping, pointed
The smallest hour on the disk of day,
Click! from the piecemeal pile, rejointed,
A new-made mannikin jumped away!
Nimble-handed, a small, trim figure,

Briskly he stooped when his work begun,
Seized a mallet with nervous vigor,

And loud on the echoing gong struck one! Clang! and the hammer that made the clamor Dropped and lay where it lay before,

And the arms of the holder fell off at the shoulder, And his head went rolling down to the floor.

Dead! ere the great bell's musical thunder
In the listening chamber throbbed away.

(No eye discovered the hidden wonder,

That dreaming under the ruins lay.) Dead as the bones in the prophet's valley, Waiting without a stir or sound,

While the pendulum's tick, tick, tick, kept tally,

And the busy wheels of the clock went round,

Till another hour to its limit, creeping,

Its sign those bodiless limbs shot thro', And a pair of mannikins, swift upleaping, Loud on the echoing gong struck two! Clang! clang! and the brazen hammers Dropped, and lay where they lay before,

Still as the shells of the sea-floor, sleeping
Countless fathoms the waves below;
Still as the stones of a city, heaping

The path of an earthquake, ages ago,—
Lay the sundered forms; but steadily swinging,
Beat the slow pendulum, tick, tick, tick,
Till lo! at the third hour, suddenly springing,
Rose three men's limbs with a click, click, click;
And, joined together by magic gifted,

In statue perfect and motion free,

The trio, each with his mallet lifted,
Loud on the echoing gong struck three !
Clang! clang! clang!

And as many as each hour's figure numbered,
So many men of that small brigade,
Whose members the marble floor encumbered,
Made themselves, and as soon unmade,
Till at noon rose all, and each one swinging
His brazen sledge by its brazen helve,

Set all the rooms of the palace ringing,

As their strokes on the silver gong told twelve.

Rajah Balpoora, Prince of Jullinder,

Died. But the great clock's tireless heart
Beat on.
And still in that hall of splendor

The twelve little sextons played their part.
And the wise who entered the palace portal
Read in the wonder the lesson plain :
Every human hour is a thing immortal,
And days but perish to rise again.
From the grave of every life we saddened,

Comes back the clamor of olden wrongs,

And our deeds that other souls have gladdened,
Ring from the past like angel songs.

THE MISSING SHIP.

It was long before the cable stretched across the ocean, when the steamers did not make such rapid runs from continent to continent, that the ship Atlantic was missing. She had been due in New York for some days, and the people began to despair. "The Atlantic has not been heard from yet?" "What news from the Atlantic on Exchange?"

"None." Telegraphic dispatches came in from all quarters. 66 Any news from the Atlantic?" And the word thrilled along the wires to the hearts of those who had no friends on board. "No."

Day after day passed, and people began to get excited, when the booming of the guus told that a ship was coming up the Narrows. People went out upon the Battery and Castle Garden with their spy-glasses; but it was a British ship-he Union Jack was flying. They watched her come up to her moorings, and their hearts sank within them.

"Any news from the Atlantic?"

"Has not the Atlantic arrived?" "No!"

"She sailed fifteen days before we did, and we have heard nothing from her." And the people said, "There is no use hoping against hope she is gone, like the President. She has made her last port."

Day after day passed, and those who had friends began to make up their mourning.

Day after day passed, and the captain's wife was so ill that the doctor said she would die, if suspense were not removed.

Day after day passed, and men looked at one another and said, "Ah! it is a sad thing about the Atlantic.”

At length one bright and beautiful morning the guns boomed across the bay, and a ship was seen coming into port. Down went the people to the Battery and Castle Garden. It was a British

ship again, and hope seemed to die within them. But up she came, making a ridge of white foam before her, and you could hear a heavy sigh from that crowd, as if it were the last hope dying out. Men looked at one another blankly. By and by some one cried out, "She has passed her moorings, she is steaming up the river."

Then they wiped away the dimness of grief, and watched the vessel. Round she came, most gallantly, and as she passed the immense crowds on the wharves and at Castle Garden, the crew hoisted flags from trucks and main-chains. An officer leaped upon the paddle, put his trumpet to his lips, and cried out, "The Atlantic is safe; she has put into port for repairs!"

Then such a shout! Oh, how they shouted! Shout! shout! shout! "The Atlantic is safe!”

Bands of music paraded the streets, telegraph wires worked all night long. "The Atlantic is safe!" bringing joy to millions of hearts; and yet not one in a hundred thousand of those who rejoiced had a friend or a relative on board that steamer.

It was sympathy with the sorrows of others, with whom they had no tie in common save that which God created when he made of one blood all the nations of the earth, and permitted us, as brethren, to call him the common Father of us all.

-John B. Gough.

THE LEGEND OF EASTER EGGS.

Trinity bells, with their hollow lungs,

And their vibrant lips, and their brazen tongues,

Over the roof of the city pour

Their Easter music with joyous roar,

Till the soaring notes to the sun are rolled,
As he swings along in his path of gold.

"Dearest papa," says my boy to me,

66

As he merrily climbs on his mother's knee,

Why are these eggs that you see me hold

Colored so finely with blue and gold?
And what is the wonderful bird that lays
Such beautiful eggs upon Easter days?"

Tenderly shine the April skies,

Like laughter and tears, in my child's blue eyes;
face in the street is gay,-

And

every

Why cloud this youngster's by saying nay?
So I cudgel my brains for the tale he begs,
And tell him the story of Easter eggs.

You have heard, my son, of the Man who died,
Crowned with keen thorns, and crucified,

And how Joseph the wealthy,-whom God reward,—
Cared for the corpse of his martyred Lord,
And piously tombed it within the rock,
And closed the gate with a mighty block.

Now, close by the tomb a fair tree grew,
With pendulous leaves, and blossoms of blue;
And deep in the green tree's shadowy breast
A beautiful singing-bird sat on her nest,

Which was bordered with mosses like malachite,
And watched and crooned through the live-long night.

Now when the bird, from her dim recess,
Beheld the Lord in His burial dress,
And looked on the heavenly face so pale,
And the dear feet pierced with the cruel nail,
Her heart nigh broke with a sudden pang,
And out of the depths of her sorrow she sang.

All night long, till the moon was up,
She sat and sang in her moss-wreathed cup,
song of sorrow as wild and shrill

A

As the homeless wind when it roams the hill,

So full of tears, so loud and long,

That the grief of the world seemed turned to song.

But soon there came through the weeping night

A glittering angel clothed in white;

And he rolled the stone from the tomb away,
Where the Lord of the Earth and Heavens lay;

And Christ arose in the cavern's gloom,

And in living lustre came from the tomb!