ODE ON A GRECIAN URN.

BY JOHN KEATS.

John Keats was born at London in 1795. He studied medicine, but after passing his examinations he never practiced. About this time he became acquainted with Shelley, Leigh Hunt, and Haydon. In 1820 he went to Naples on account of his health, and from there to Rome, where he died in 1821. His longer poems are: "Endymion" (which poem was most severely criticised at the time of its publication), "Lamia," "Isabella," and "The Eve of Saint Agnes."

Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;
Bold lover, never, never canst thou kiss,

Though winning near the goal—yet do not grieve,
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,
For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!

O, Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede
Of marble men and maidens overwrought,
With forest branches and the trodden weed;
Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought
As doth eternity: Cold pastoral!

When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe

Than ours, a friend to man to whom thou say'st,

"Beauty is truth, truth beauty"—that is all

Ye know on earth, truth, and all ye need to know.

TO ALTHEA FROM PRISON.

BY RICHARD LOVELACE.

This lyric of Richard Lovelace's is, with the "Lucasta," the best known and most often quoted of his poems.

When Love with unconfined wings.

Hovers within my gates,

And my divine Althea brings

To whisper at my grates;
When I lie tangled in her hair

And fettered with her eye,

The birds that wanton in the air
Know no such liberty

When flowing cups pass swiftly round
With no allaying Thames,

Our careless heads with roses crowned,
Our hearts with loyal flames;

When thirsty grief in wine we steep,

When healths and draughts go free

Fishes that tipple in the deep

Know no such liberty.

SONG.

BY JOHN BUNYAN.

John Bunyan was born at Elstow in 1628. He was a tinker, as his father was before him, but he finally became a soldier in the parliamentary army. In 1653 he became a nonconformist and went about the country preaching until he was arrested under the statutes against that doctrine. While in prison Bunyan began his well-known allegory"Pilgrim's Progress." Under Charles II. he was released and made pastor at Bedford. He died at London in 1688.

In the early part of the last century, when the star of Moore was at its zenith, no song was more popular than this, perhaps as much for the charming air to which it is set as for the beauty and rhythm of its words.

Believe me, if all those endearing charms,

Which I gaze on so fondly today,

Were to change by tomorrow, and fleet in my arms,
Like fairy-gifts fading away,

Thou wouldst still be ador'd, as this moment thou art,
Let thy loveliness fade as it will

And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart
Would entwine itself verdantly still.

It is not while beauty and youth are thine own,
And thy cheeks unprofan'd by a tear,

That the fervor and faith of a soul can be known,
To which time will but make thee more dear;
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets,
But as surely loves on to the close,

As the sunflower turns on her god, when he sets,
The same look that she turned when he rose.

ΙΟΙ