864. C. M. T. Richardson.

"The Hymn of Summer."

1How glad the tone when summer's sun

Wreathes the gay world with flowers,

And trees bend down with golden fruit,

And birds are in the bowers!

2The moon sends silent music down

Upon each earthly thing;

And always, since creation's dawn,

The stars together sing.

3Shall man remain in silence, then,

While all beneath the skies

The chorus joins? no, let us sing,

And while our voices rise,

4O, let our lives, great God, breathe forth

A constant melody;

And every action be a tone

In that sweet hymn to thee!

Autumn.

1The leaves, around me falling,

Are preaching of decay;

The hollow winds are calling,

"Come, pilgrim, come away:"

The day, in night declining,

Says I must, too, decline;

The year its bloom resigning,

Its lot foreshadows mine.

2The light my path surrounding,

The loves to which I cling,

The hopes within me bounding,

The joys that round me wing,--

All, all, like stars at even,

Just gleam and shoot away,

Pass on before to heaven,

And chide at my delay.

3The friends gone there before me

Are calling from on high,

And happy angels o'er me

Tempt sweetly to the sky:

"Why wait," they say, "and wither,

'Mid scenes of death and sin?

O, rise to glory, hither,

And find true life begin."