Library of the best American literature / Containing the lives of our authors in story form, their portraits, their homes, and their personal traits, how they worked and what they wrote; choice selections from eminent writers, embracing great American poets and novelists, foremost women in American letters, distinguished critics and essayists, our national humorists, noted journalists and magazine contributors, popular writers for young people, great orators and public lecturers

by Unknown

I believe we were made to be gay,

And all of youth not given to love

Is vainly squandered away,

And strewn through life’s low labors,

Like gold in the desert sands,

Are love’s swift kisses and sighs and vows

And the clasp of clinging hands.

And when you are old and lonely,

In memory’s magic shrine

You will see on your thin and wasting hands,