Sent with a Copy of “Red Letter Days Abroad”

Book of my youth, I send thee to a friend

Met, comprehended, loved, alas! too late,—

Too near the sad, inevitable end

Decreed by life's inexorable fate;

Yet though an ocean's billows roll between,

And two great continents our paths divide,

The unseen subtly triumphs o'er the seen,

We walk in spirit, ever side by side;

He on the stately Mississippi's shore,

I‘ mid the snow and roses of Tyrol,

But in my heart he dwells forevermore,—

Belovèd friend, and double of my soul.