OLD LETTERS.

Thames Star, Volume VI, Issue 1814, 26 October 1874, Page 2

OLD LETTERS.

(PBOII CHAMBEBS' JOTTBNAL. Burn them wholesale! Ancienb Bear* Will blood and throb if you delay. Thrust them in between the bars, Tied up in their packets—Stay! I see my niothor's writing, and My father's : ay, 'tis theirs indeed, Though lettered in a large round round That their little eon might read. How I prized ! New to school, How nay very soul did acho ! Grief had kJled a little fool, If the heart could really break. Clissold's writing! " Dear old boy, Whatever happens, I'm your friead." He meant it too : without alloy Our friendship was, and feared no end. How ofc, while dropping down the stream, Or 'dly stretched among the heather, We shared ia Youth's presumptuous dream And vowed to storm the world together. O fool! to trust a bjyish word; O fool! to feel a boyish sorrow j That Clissold walking with a lord, Would cab me, if we met, to-morrow* Burn the letters! Ancient scars Will bleed and thrjb if you delayl Thrust them in between the bars, Tied up in their packets—-—Stay! That hand so delicate and small, Traced upon paper pinky white, Does like a happy dream recall A time of heavenly delight. "My life! my love! (0 tender girl!) 'Twill kill mo if you are not true." And here's a brown and silky curl, Tied with the faithful colour, blut. The honest silk has faded quita j For would this only love of mine Shed, if she saw me dead to-night, A tingle tear for auld lang syne ? Burn them wholesale.' Ancient scan Will bleed and throb with this delay; Thrust the letters through the ban, Open not another—-Stay! That foreign sheet I cannot burn; 'Tis Tom's last letter; give it me! He writes in it of his return To those—he ne'er again should ste. Burn it; burn all. For they who traced 4 * The lines with such keen pleasure read* Whose lore can never be replaced, Are false, arc fickle, or are dead. Burn them wholesale! Ancient scan ' Will bleed afresh with each delay. Thrust them in between the bars; They belong to Yesterday,