rule, and to themselves the exception. But, alas for the graceful and noble boy, on whom nature and fortune had lavished every gift but to make a richer prize for death! How many lofty hopes, how many generous emotions, how many joyous aspirings, were quenched in that unfulfilled destiny! That young heart had had no time to harden—that young soul no time to chill; warm and fresh, true and kindling, they went down to the grave, all trace of paradise not worn away in the brief career.
"Whom the gods love die young," is one of the truths taught by the old Greek poets, those poets half sage, half seer. And methinks, that though tears are shed abundantly when the coffin-lid presses down some fair and bright head, we were wiser did we keep those tears for the living. Let the young perish in their hour of promise—how much will they be spared!—passion, that kindles but to consume the heart, and leaves either vacancy or regret, a ruin or a desert; ambition, that only reaches its goal to find it worthless when gained, or but the starting-place for another feverish race, doomed again to end in disappointment; enemies that cross us at every step; friends that deceive—and what friends do not?—the blighted hope, the embittered feeling, the wasted powers, the re-
