"The human heart has hidden treasures

In secret kept, in silence sealed;

The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures,
Whose charms were broken if revealed.

And days may pass in dull confusion,
And nights in noisy routs may fly,
While, lost in fame's or wealth's illusion,
The memory of the past may die.

"But there are hours of lonely musing,
Such as in evening silence come,
When soft as birds their pinions closing,
The heart's best feelings gather home.
Then, in our souls there seems to languish
A tender grief that is not woe;

And thoughts that once wrung groans of anguish,
Now cause some gentle tears to flow.

"And feelings once as strong as passions,
Float softly back-a faded dream;
Our own sharp griefs and wild sensations
The taste of others' sufferings seem;
Oh! when the heart is freshly bleeding,
How it longs for that time to be,
When through the mists of years receding,
Its woes but live in reverie!

'And it can dwell on moonlight glimmer,
On evening shades and loneliness,
And while the sky grows dim and dimmer,
Heed no unmeasured woe's distress-

Only a deeper impress given

By lonely hour and darkened room,
To solemn thoughts that soar to heaven,
Seeking a life and world to come."

There are two periods in the life of man in

which the evening hour is peculiarly interesting

in youth and old age. mellow moonlight, its and soothing shades, its can commune with our loves, or twine the wreaths of friends, while there is none to bear us witness but the heavens and the spirits that hold their endless Sabbath there or look into the bosom of creation, and look and listen till we can almost see and hear the waving wings and melting songs of other worlds. To youth the evening is delightful. It accords with the flow of his light spirits, the fervor of his fancy, and the softness of his heart. Evening is also the delight of virtuous age; it affords hours of undisturbed contemplation; it seems an emblem of the calm and tranquil close of busy life; serene, placid, and mild, the impress of its great Creator stamped upon it, it spreads its quiet wings over the grave, and seems to promise that all shall be peace beyond it.

In youth we love it for its million stars, its then rich still serenity; amid these we

Eventide is also the pleasant time for silent study or social reading; the brief but beautiful season sacred to bodily repose and mental refreshment. The expres sive lines of Longfellow, addressed to a gifted poetess, are susceptible of application to all who wisely "make merchandise of time," by bartering it for intellectual wealth:

"Oh, precious evenings! all too swiftly sped!
Leaving us heirs to amplest heritages

Of all the best thoughts of the greatest sages,
And giving tongues unto the silent dead!

How our hearts glowed and trembled as she read,
Interpreting by tones the wondrous pages

Of the great poet who foreruns the ages,
Anticipating all that shall be said!

Oh, happy reader! having for thy text

The magic book, whose Sibylline leaves have caught
The rarest essence of all human thought!"

It is worthy of note that the Greek poets gave to night that beautiful name Euphrone-indicating the season of good feeling-the hour of hope, of calm, yet joyous contemplation. It is true, the inspired description of the heavenly state says, "There shall be no night there." But in our present imperfect condition of being, the idea of the highest earthly bliss would be marred by its absence from the picture. As yet we cannot dispense with the shade.

With the following beautiful lines, we leave the reader to the inspirations of this stilly hour, to its sweet visions. its vigils, and its vespers:

"Yon pale cloud

Is tinting with the sunset's hectic flush,
So is the distant tor now glory-browed;
And now a solemn hush

Steals from the skies adown the mountain-side;
'Tis the deep stillness of the eventide.

"The white moon

Grows golden in the grey dome of the sky;
Brighter she climbs the dark'ning steep, and soon
Will lighten radiantly.

Now in the shifting purple hues of even
Earth, air, and sea, seem blending into heaven.

"The tall trees

Throw now no shades, for all is dusk around;
The star is splendid o'er the seas, the breeze

Is dead with every sound

But the sweet streams. Myriads of loving eyes Yearn on the earth from out the blending skies.

"The brown tint

Has faded into gloom on the sharp crest
Of the far mountain. Only starlight's glint,
On the stream's heaving breast.

The lark and bee are quiet-the warm glow
Has left the cloud and the hill's frowning brow.

"Heavy dews

Pearl the soft eyelids of night-cradled flowers, That opening, smile but when the warm sun woos In daylight's golden hours.

Sadness comes on me with the twilight grey,

FAME.

Though fame is smoke,

Its fumes are frankincense to human thoughts.

BYRON.

WILE

VILBERFORCE being asked what constituted the purest of human pleasures, replied-to do an act of charity in secret, and afterwards to have it discovered. Such an instance seems to invest fame with something of tangibility. The quintessence of Fame, according to the estimate of a modern author, consists in the loving admiration of one's own family circle; yet in the popular acceptation, such a limitation is too contracted for the vaulting ambition of the majority of mankind. It is

"Fame's loud clarion that most bewitches men;

O popular applause! what heart of man

Is proof against thy sweet seducing charms?"

This love of human applause exhibits itself in Protæan forms; it enters into all conditions of society, the rude and the refined, the rich and the poor, the young and the old. Indeed, it is seen to bud forth with the blossoms of childhood-for even prattling infancy

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