he breathed the hard word "part,"
Only for earth's short span, my sweet, for love can never
die,
And the spirit bond but strengthens, as Time's wild waves
sweep bye.

Mine! by the vows soft-whispered, where hand in hand we
strayed
In twilight hours, through summer lanes, or roamed in the
lonely glade;
But the dream in its glory perished, and earth's brightest
hope was fled,
And light from my life was faded, when they laid thee with
the dead!

Elsie! my bright-haired sister! tender blossom and pure!
You drooped in that last storm's fury, too fragile its might
to endure;
And then I left the home-nest when my last sweet dove had
flown,
And sought to forget, amid stranger scenes, the sorrows my
soul had known.

It's thus the shadowy phantoms come back from the spirit-
shore,

When I cry in my lonely anguish for the joys now mine no
more.
I thrill with a passion'd yearning for the fuller life to be,
When my tired soul faints in wonder, lost in earth's