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HYMN TO DEATH.

Even while he hugs himself on his escape,
Trembles, as, doubly terrible, at length,
Thy steps o'ertake him, and there is no time
For parley-nor will bribes unclench thy grasp.
Oft, too, dost thou reform thy victim, long
Ere his last hour. And when the reveller,
Mad in the chase of pleasure, stretches on,
And strains each nerve, and clears the path of life
Like wind, thou point'st him to the dreadful goal,
And shak'st thy hour-glass in his reeling eye,
And check'st him in mid course. Thy skeleton hand
Shows to the faint of spirit the right path,

And he is warned, and fears to step aside.

Thou sett'st between the ruffian and his crime
Thy ghastly countenance, and his slack hand
Drops the drawn knife. But, oh, most fearfully
Dost thou show forth Heaven's justice, when thy shafts
Drink up the ebbing spirit-then the hard

Of heart and violent of hand restores

The treasure to the friendless wretch he wronged.

Then from the writhing bosom thou dost pluck

The guilty secret; lips, for ages sealed,
Are faithless to the dreadful trust at length,

And give it up; the felon's latest breath
Absolves the innocent man who bears his crime;
The slanderer, horror smitten, and in tears,
Recalls the deadly obloquy he forged

To work his brother's ruin. Thou dost make
Thy penitent victim utter to the air

The dark conspiracy that strikes at life,

HYMN TO DEATH.

And aims to whelm the laws; ere yet the hour
Is come, and the dread sign of murder given.

Thus, from the first of time, hast thou been found
On virtue's side; the wicked, but for thee,

Had been too strong for the good; the great of earth
Had crushed the weak for ever. Schooled in guile
For ages, while each passing year had brought
Its baneful lesson, they had filled the world
With their abominations; while its tribes,
Trodden to earth, imbruted, and despoiled,
Had knelt to them in worship; sacrifice
Had smoked on many an altar, temple roofs
Had echoed with the blasphemous prayer and hymn:
But thou, the great reformer of the world,
Tak'st off the sons of violence and fraud
In their green pupilage, their lore half learned-
Ere guilt has quite o'errun the simple heart
God gave them at their birth, and blotted out

His image. Thou dost mark them, flushed with hope,
As on the threshold of their vast designs

Doubtful and loose they stand, and strik'st them down.

Alas, I little thought that the stern power

Whose fearful praise I sung, would try me thus
Before the strain was ended. It must cease
For he is in his grave who taught my youth
The art of verse, and in the bud of life
Offered me to the muses. Oh, cut off
Untimely when thy reason in its strength,
Ripened by years of toil and studious search

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264

HYMN TO DEATH.

And watch of Nature's silent lessons, taught
Thy hand to practise best the lenient art
To which thou gavest thy laborious days,

And, last, thy life. And, therefore, when the earth
Received thee, tears were in unyielding eyes

And on hard cheeks, and they who deemed thy skill
Delayed their death-hour, shuddered and turned pale
When thou wert gone. This faltering verse, which thou

Shalt not, as wont, o'erlook, is all I have
To offer at thy grave-this-and the hope
To copy thy example, and to leave

A name of which the wretched shall not think
As of an enemy's, whom they forgive
As all forgive the dead. Rest, therefore, thou
Whose early guidance trained my infant steps-
Rest, in the bosom of God, till the brief sleep
Of death is over, and a happier life

Shall dawn to waken thine insensible dust.

Now thou art not-and yet the men whose guilt
Has wearied Heaven for vengeance-he who bears
False witness-he who takes the orphan's bread,
And robs the widow-he who spreads abroad
Polluted hands in mockery of prayer,

Are left to cumber earth. Shuddering I look
On what is written, yet I blot not out
The desultory numbers-let them stand,
The record of an idle revery.

"EARTH'S CHILDREN CLEAVE TO EARTH."

EARTH'S children cleave to Earth-her frail

Decaying children dread decay.

Yon wreath of mist that leaves the vale,
And lessens in the morning ray:
Look, how, by mountain rivulet,
It lingers, as it upward creeps,
And clings to fern and copsewood set
Along the green and dewy steeps:
Clings to the fragrant kalmia, clings
To precipices fringed with grass,
Dark maples where the wood-thrush sings,
And bowers of fragrant sassafras.
Yet all in vain-it passes still

From hold to hold, it cannot stay,

And in the very beams that fill

The world with glory, wastes away.
Till, parting from the mountain's brow,
It vanishes from human eye,

And that which sprung of earth is now
A portion of the glorious sky.

TO A WATERFOWL.

WHITHER, 'midst falling dew,

While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue Thy solitary way!

Vainly the fowler's eye

Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As, darkly painted on the crimson sky,

Thy figure floats along.

Seek'st thou the plashy brink

Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,
Or where the rocking billows rise and sink
On the chafed ocean side?

There is a Power whose care Teaches thy way along that pathless coast, The desert and illimitable air,

Lone wandering, but not lost.

All day thy wings have fanned,
At that far height, the cold thin atmosphere,
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,
Though the dark night is near.