The "Medical Spring."

I.

Let tipplers all boast of the pleasure divine That is found in old whisky, in beer and in wine-- But what are all those to a feller who knows Where the "Medical Spring" in its purity flows, And has knelt at its brink and just drank his fill Of the clear, sparkling fluid, from Nature's own still?

II.

How often I've strayed on a hot Summer's day Where it gurgles and gushes, then flows on its way With a ripple as sweet as the music that died When the tones of loved voices are to us denied, And mirrored my face in the "Medical Spring," Where the beetling old cliffs their cool shadows fling!

III.

Not riches, nor honors, nor place do I crave, Ere they lay me at last to rest in the grave, But oh, let me hear its music once more, And drink from its depths while I kneel on its shore-- Then bear me away on the Death Angel's wing While my lips are yet moist from the "Medical Spring!"

AN "IDYL" OF THE BALL.

I.

In reel, in waltz, in lancer's maze, She moved with pretty air of grace, And all the ball-room's brilliant blaze Seemed borrowed brightness from her face! O, winsome maid, demure and sweet! I'll ne'er forget when first I met her, And saw the dainty slippered feet Glide o'er the floor at Linnietta!

II.

O, dreams of youth and beauty rare, What rose-hued visions thou canst paint! But none in loveliness compare With her who seemed Love's patron saint! Her pictured image haunts the mind, And, oh, I never can forget her, Nor rarer pleasure hope to find Than dance with her at Linnietta!

III.

Arrayed in softly flowing gown, The love-light flashing from her eyes-- With cheeks aglow like roses blown Beneath the ardent summer skies-- No artist hand could fitly trace The wondrous charm that did beset her, When tripping with a fairy's grace O'er the waxen floor at Linnietta!

DREAMS.

I.

The sweetest dreams, it seems to me, that we can ever know, Are those the fancy brings to us of days of long-ago, When rainbow-tinted pictures all are like a mirage flung Upon the canvas memory weaves--of days when we were young.

II.

The step may falter, eye be dim--the brow may wrinkles wear, And underneath the crumbling mould our friends be sleeping there-- But oh, these visions come to us as to the rose the dew, And while with raptured gaze we look the heart seems ever new.

III.

Oh, when perhaps at last we're left a laggard on life's stage, This is the mellowed draught we quaff our longings to assuage-- As sweet as that from Paradise the smiling Houris hand The Prophet's faithful followers when at its gates they stand!

IV.

If one last prayer were left to me for my declining days, Its form should be that I might hear the chimes that memory plays, And when at last upon my grave the wavy grass had sprung, Some passer-by could truly say "His heart was ever young!"