DRIFTING.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 242, 18 February 1888, Page 8 (Supplement)

DRIFTING.

Oh ! soft as softest motion Of brcezos cool and sweet, Our fairy skiff meanders Beneath the gay verandahs Of many a choice retreat, By sloping lawns, whose verdure With cooling freshness gleams ; By emerald banks, whoso edges Are fringed with tangled sedges. And floral wealth that teems. Close by the sylvan islets That gem this beauteous stream, Our lightsome boat is gliding, The rippling waves dividing:, Now bright with tenderest sheen. Blue skios are bonding o'er us, So calm and brightly fair, Scarco the enfolding shadows On distant hills and meadows, Can dim the brightness therej An all-subduing stillness Pervades the landscape round ; Beneath Nights stars unclosing, All Nature seoms roposlng In dreamless slumber bound. Oh ! it is sweet to linger At such a time as this, On the coy, winding river, Whose wavelets wanton ever, Elate with conscious bliss. Most sweet when she, whose presenea Beyond all landscape grace, Is near, divinely thrilling The heart withioy excolling The poet's skill to trace. Where the long, drooping branches Just kiss the listless tide, I hear the music thrilling Of birds their love-song trilling. Resounding far and wide. But ah! a sweeter mutic Is mine the while to hear ; And smiles excite a rapture More dear than all which Nature Hath manifested here. I read a golden secret In her sapphire-shining eyes, Pure as the rosy blossom That decks her guileless bosom - In unassuming guise. And ao tho wish arises— Oh God I that I could bind These moments now, whose fleetness With an Elysian sweetness Is potently enshrined I A. W. HUKBT. Helensville.

Writing a letter is, to many people* an irksome task ; but it isn'fc half flO irksom* as it is to bear a lawyer reading your letter aloud about five years afterwards in open court. ' A man, while an his way to borrow neighbour's paper was atruok by lightning and killed. Wo bare no comment to mak* here. To intelligent people it isn't nece«r Wry.