A WRAITH OF SUMMERTIME.

In its color, shade and shine,

‘ T was a summer warm as wine,

With an effervescent flavoring of flowered bough and vine,

And a fragrance and a taste

Of ripe roses gone to waste,

And a dreamy sense of sun - and moon - and star-light interlaced.

‘ Twas a summer such as broods

O'er enchanted solitudes,

Where the hand of Fancy leads us through voluptuary moods,

And with lavish love out-pours

All the wealth of out-of-doors,

And woos our feet o'er velvet paths and honeysuckle floors.

‘ Twas a summertime long dead,—

And its roses, white and red,

And its reeds and water-lilies down along the river-bed,—

O they all are ghostly things —

For the ripple never sings,

And the rocking lily never even rustles as it rings!