J

Oh ! the Snow, the beautiful snoyv,

Filling the sky and earth below ;

Over the housetops, over the street,

Over the heads of the people you meet ; ;

Dancing;

Flirting,

Skimming along;

Beautiful snow ! it can do no wrong.

Flying to kiss a fair lady's cheek.

Clinging 10 lips in a frolicsome freak,

Beautiful snow from the heaven above,

Pure as au angel, gentle as love !

Oh ! the snow; the beautiful snow,

How the (lakes gather and laugh as they go,

Whirling ont in the maddening fun,

It plays in its glee with every one ;

Chasing,

Laughing,

Hurrying by ;

It lights on the face and sparkles the eye!

And the dogs, with a bark and a bound,

Snap the crystals that eddv around ;

The town is alive, and its heart in a glow.

To welcome the coming of beautiful snow !

How wild the crowd goes swaying along.

Hailing each other with humor and song !

Ho the gay sledges like meteors flash by.

Bright for the moment, then lost to the eye;

Kingin g,

Swinging,

Dashing they go,

Over the crust of the beautif ul snow ;

Snow so pure when it falls from the sky,

To be trampled in mud by the crowd pass­

ing by.

To be trampled and tracked bv the thousands

of feet

Till it blends with the filth 111 the horrible

street.

Once I was pure as the snow but I fell !

Fell like the snow flakes from heaven to hell !

Fell to be trampled as filth in the street;

Fell to be sco lied, to be spit on and beat ;

Pleading,

Cursing,

Dreading; to die.

Selling my soul to whoever would bur.

Dealing in sh&mc for a morsel of bread,

Hating the living and fearing the dead.

Merciful God, have I fallen so low?

And yet I was once like the beautiful snow.

Once I was fair as the beautiful snow.

With an eye like its crystals, a heart like its

glow ;

Once 1 was loved for my innocent grace

Flattered and sought for the charms of my

face ;

Father,

Mother,

Sisters all,

God and myself, I have lost by my fall ;

The veriest wretch that goes shivering by,

Will make a wide sweep lest I wander too

nigh ;

For all that is on or above me I know

There's nothing that's pure as the beautiful

snow.

How strange it should be that this beautiful

snow

Should fall on a sinner nowhere to go !

How strange it should be, when the night

comes auain,

If the snow and the ice struck my desperate

brain,

Fainting,

Freezing,

Dying alone.

Too wicked for prayer, too weak for a moan,

To be heard in the streets of the crazy town,

Gone mad in the joy of the snow coming

down.

To be so and die in my terrible woe,

With a bed and a shroud of the beautiful snow.

"THE IIE.