Love me, beloved: for, many a day,
Will the mist of the morning pass away;
Many a day will the brightness of noon
Lead to a night that hath lost her moon;
And in joy or in sadness, in autumn or spring,
Thy love to my soul is a needful thing.

Love me, beloved: for thou mayest lie
Dead in my sight, 'neath the same blue sky;
Love me, O love me, and let me know

The love that within thee moves to and fro;
That many a form of thy love may be
Gathered around thy memory.

Love me, beloved: for I may lie

Dead in thy sight, 'neath the same blue sky;
The more thou hast loved me, the less thy pain,
The stronger thy hope till we meet again;
And forth on the pathway we do not know,
With a load of love, my soul would go.

Love me, beloved: for one must lie
Motionless, lifeless, beneath the sky;
The pale stiff lips return no kiss

To the lips that never brought love amiss;
And the dark brown earth be heaped above
The head that lay on the bosom of love.

Love me, beloved: for both must lie
Under the earth and beneath the sky;

The world be the same when we are gone;

The leaves and the waters all sound on;

The spring comes forth, and the wild flowers live,

Gifts for the poor man's love to give;

The sea, the lordly, the gentle sea,

Tell the same tales to others than thee;
And joys, that flush with an inward morn,
Irradiate hearts that are yet unborn;

A youthful race call our earth their own,
And gaze on its wonders from thought's high throne,
Embraced by fair Nature, the youth will embrace
The maid beside him, his queen of the race:
When thou and I shall have passed away

Like the foam-flake thou lookedst on yesterday.

Love me, beloved: for both must tread

On the threshold of Hades, the house of the dead;
Where now but in thinkings strange we roam,
We shall live and think, and shall be at home;
The sights and the sounds of the spirit land
No stranger to us than the white sea-sand,
Than the voice of the waves, and the eye of the moon,
Than the crowded street in the sunlit noon.

I pray thee to love me, beloved of my heart;
If we love not truly, at death we part;
And how would it be with our souls to find
That love, like a body, was left behind!

Love me, beloved: Hades and Death
Shall vanish away like a frosty breath;

These hands, that now are at home in thine,
Shall clasp thee again, if thou still art mine;
And thou shalt be mine, my spirits bride,
In the ceaseless flow of eternity's tide,
If the truest love that thy heart can know
Meet the truest love that from mine can flow.
Pray God, beloved, for thee and me,

That our souls may be wedded eternally.

O, MY LOVE IS LIKE A WIND OF

O

DEATH

MY love is like a wind of death,

That turns me to a stone!

O, my love is like a desert breath,
That burns me to the bone!

O, my love is like a flower with a purple glow,
And a purple scent all day!

But a black spot lies at the heart below,
And smells all night of clay.

O, my love is like the poison sweet
That lurks in the hooded cell!

One flash in the eyes, one bounding beat,
And then the passing bell!

O, my love she's like a white, white rose!
And I am the canker-worm:
Never the bud to a blossom blows;
It falls in the rainy storm.

THE HURT OF LOVE

THE hurt, the hurt, and the hurt of love! Wherever the sun shines, the waters go. It hurts the snowdrop, it hurts the dove, God on His throne, and man below.

But sun would not shine, nor waters go,

Snowdrop tremble, nor fair dove moan,

God be on high, nor man below,

But for love-for the love with its hurt alone.

Thou knowest, O Saviour, its hurt and its sorrows, Didst rescue its joy by the might of thy pain: Lord of all yesterdays, days, and to-morrows, Help us love on in the hope of thy gain:

Hurt as it may, love on, love forever;

Love for loves sake, like the Father above, But for whose brave-hearted Son we had never Known the sweet hurt of the sorrowful love.

SONG

EYES of beauty, eyes of light,

Sweetly, softly, sadly bright!

Draw not, ever, o'er my eye,
Radiant mists of ecstasy.

Be not proud, O glorious orbs!
Not your mystery absorbs;
But the starry soul that lies
Looking through your night of eyes.

One moment, be less perfect, sweet;
Sin once in something small;
One fault to lift me on my feet
From love's too perfect thrall!

For now I have no soul; a sea
Fills up my caverned brain,
Heaving in silent waves to thee,
The mistress of that main.

GUY DE MAUPASSANT

HENRY RENÉ ALBERT GUY DE MAUPASSANT, famous French novelist, was born at Miromesnil, Seine-Inférieure, France, in 1850; died at Paris, in 1893. His first bow to the literary public was made through a short story, "Boule-de-Suif." He wrote rapidly, producing over twenty books, prose and verse, in less than twelve years. He belonged to the naturalistic school of French writers, and his style is most graphic. His best works are "Mademoiselle Fifi," "Contes du jour et de la nuit,” “La Petite Roque," "La Main Gauche," and Notre Cœur."

66

WHO CAN TELL?

(Copyright by Brentanos. Translated by E. P. Robins)

Y

I

My God! My God! At last, then, I am to com

But

mit to paper that which happened me. can I do it? Shall I dare do it? It is all so strange, so inexplicable, so incomprehensible, so maddening!

Were I not assured of what my eyes beheld; were I not certain that there was nothing defective in my reasoning, that there was no error in my observation, no link missing in the chain of rigorous verification, I should set myself down as a mere bedlamite, the sport of a fantastic vision. After all, who can tell?

I am to-day the inmate of an asylum for lunatics, but I took up my abode there voluntarily, from caution, from fear! Only one living soul is acquainted with my story. The physician here. I am