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Nantz is a fair city, but it seemed the very fairest in the world to the traveller, for he had been absent years: he left it poor, but he came back rich; and the home of his youth was again to be the home of his age.

" down your oars, the waters trace Their own path fast enough for me; Life sometimes asks a breathing space— Such I am fain this hour should be.

"Fair city, I am come once more; Travel and toil are on my brow; With all I thought so great of yore— With all I think so little now!

"Sorrow for friends I left behind— Misgiving fears were with me then; And yet I bore a lighter mind Than now I see those walls again.

"Hope is youth's prophet, and foretells The future that its wish reveals; The energy that in us dwells Then judges but by what it feels.

"And it feels buoyant spirits, health, And confidence, and earnestness; And it ascribes such power to wealth Which but to seek is to possess. T