A BALLAD.

A SWEET bird sat on yonder tree
And thus it trilled its lay,
While to and fro the heedless world
Was passing on its way:

"The first love and the true love
That dieth not for ever,
That liveth on and hopeth on,
And living changeth never;

"The great love, and the strong love,

The true through good and ill, That changeth not through changing time, But living loveth still;

"The one love, and the pure love,
That still forgetteth not,

But liveth still, and loveth still,
Although it be forgot;

"Ah! can ye still be blind to it,
Nor see it, where it is?
Can any love be truer love

Than such a love as this?"

Still to and fro the careless world
Went passing on its way,
And heeded not the simple bird
That sang upon the spray.

And soon the winter's cruel storm

Came up across the wold,

And stripped the tree of leaf and bloom, And killed the bird with cold.

And still the heartless world went on,

And let the songster lie;

But one sweet maiden paused awhile,
And wept to see it die.

She raised it up with gentle care
To see if life were fled,

"Ah me!" she cried, "too late! too late! The pretty bird is dead!"

But still within her heart she bore
The music of the lay,

The bird had loved to sing of old,
When sitting on the spray.

And still for her the dead bird sang

Of love that changeth not,

But liveth on and loveth on,

Although it be forgot.

E.

THE PICTURE GALLERY,

I. THE BORE.

THERE is a certain trite commodity with which it is our painful lot to be more conversant, while we are at the University, than perhaps at any other period of our natural existence. This article rejoices in common-place, delights in inflicting pain on others, and is as dead to any sense of shame or modesty as Mr. Swinbourne is to that of decency. Deficient in tact and taste, it may be compared to the Thersites, whose voice was so well known to the Grecian host, and of whom Sophocles sarcastically remarks

ὃς οὐκ ἂν εἴλετ ̓ εἰσάπαξ εἰπεῖν ὅπου

μηδεὶς ἐψη.

And a modern poet, speaking of the same man, uses the following words, which are somewhat longer and hardly so pointed as the Greek,

Thersites only clamoured in the throng,
Loquacious, loud and turbulent of tongue:
Awed by no shame, by no respect controll'd,
In scandal busy, in reproaches bold.

This creature of which I am speaking is unfortunately human; but it is confined to the masculine gender. In point of fact it has a hundred feet and a hundred heads, like the fearful monsters of classical times; but to the outward eye it seems to possess no more than the ordinary members common to humanity. It may be likened to Proteus in that it is capable of assuming many forms, with this difference however, that it never becomes invisible, but is always

Gross as a mountain, open, palpable.

One of the numerous forms which it assumes, and the one to which perhaps it seems most attached, is that of the intimate friend. From the stage of friendship, alas! to

that of relationship there is but a narrow gulf, which it crosses with the greatest ease, and then approaches nearer and nearer to its unfortunate victim till it becomes a veritable first cousin. It is quite useless to deny all connexion with your persecutor: you are assured that you are labouring under a painful mistake. Your mother's cousin married the cousin of your persecutor's step mother, and so of course you are related. Don't attempt to deny it-Ipse dixit. The bore has declared it to the world, and the relationship has become a matter of history. And here by the way may we not all pay a slight tribute of respect to that most charming of all relations? What is there that a cousin may not do with propriety and decency? What a multitude of sins and shortcomings does that name cover! Under its all receiving cloak we may insult, abuse, intrude upon, and partake of the hospitality of anybody without amends. The name is sufficiently distant and sufficiently near for all purposes. We can use or abuse it at pleasure. And what is more-it is a dish that can be cooked and served up at a moment's notice. But to proceed. Having thus introduced himself to your notice, the cousin proceeds to treat you quite in a family way, turns up at all sorts of odd times. You are just going off to a concert with a friend, and your carriage is waiting at the door, when the bore comes up and professing his intense joy at having met you after a long absence of one hour, he declares his intention of accompanying you. Of course he did not know you were going. He happened to be going there himself on foot, and turning the corner he espied your carriage. Wasn't it odd! Unluckily there is only room inside for two, and so you offer to sit outside, which after a show of resistance he agrees to; taking great care to say as soon as you are well started that he would never have allowed it, if he had known it was raining; though it has been raining the whole day. He wants to have the carriage stopped and to change places: but as you are already two hours late it is impossible. On arriving in the concert room he takes great care to appear very intimate with you. You are somewhat late, and the noise you make in entering causes everybody to turn round and look at you. Then he seizes the golden opportunity, and while everybody is attracted by his loud voice he calls you by an affectionate title or perversion of your Christian name. At last you reach your place, and then you reasonably hope that he will at least hold his tongue and let you enjoy the music. But alas-in this fond hope you are doomed to the bitterest disappointment. For he

makes running comments upon the performances of the various artistes, taking great care the while to inform you that he has heard all the great singers of the day. He sighs theatrically, and pulling his whiskers in a fond and affectionate manner, assures you that Tietjens' voice now is not to be compared with what it was when she sang at Marlborough House last year. This opens a new channel to him, and the whole force and volubility of the stream setting in this direction causes an instantaneous inundation. You are deluged with descriptions of the dresses, looks, and manners of the people who were present on that occasion. The different performances are passed in review: and withal his knowledge seems so thorough, and his details are so minute that you think he must have been an eyewitness. However on your pressing the point he reluctantly owns that his information is only deduced from a newspaper which a friend lent him for the occasion. You turn away in disgust and if your would-be cousin has any sense of shame he leaves off boring you for the rest of the evening; but too often he is too used to being snubbed to take the hint, so he returns to the charge. It would however be tedious to recount any more of his doings, for they soon get monotonous. He seems like a piece of machinery wound up every week with the key of annoyance to humanity, and when he has run out his whole length he begins again, and his next week is an exact reproduction of the preceding one. Unfortunately he is not so given to getting out of order as a piece of modern machinery is, and so he is never placed hors de combat.

Our Proteus assumes many other forms besides that which I have already described. Perhaps he adopts some intellectual theory and is smitten with a desire of proselytism. In this he calls on you at all sorts of unseasonable hours, appearing in your rooms quite out of breath with his haste. He brings with him papers and pamphlets which he asks you to correct for the press. He is in a great hurry as he is afraid that some one will anticipate him in his mighty undertaking. If he thinks that you do not duly appreciate certain passages, he calls your attention to the rounded periods, the rich overflowing language, the beauty of imagery, and the depth of feeling which underlies them. At other times he commends some terse epigrammatic sentence, and remarks that he hardly knew before the depth and clearness of the intellectual fountain welling up within him. Having proceeded thus far in his self-laudatory remarks, he deprecates any praise from you, reads you a short lecture on the ad