Page images
PDF
EPUB

But it wandered down, with its glow of light,
And its robe of sunny rays.

It seemed like molten silver, thrown
Together in floating flame;

And as we looked, we named it, then,

The fount whence all colors came:

There were rainbows furled with a careless grace,
And the brightest red that glows;
The purple amethyst there had place,
And the hues of a full-blown rose.

And the vivid green, as the sun-lit grass
Where the pleasant rain hath been;
And the ideal hues, that, thought-like, pass
Through the minds of fanciful men;

They beamed full clear-and that form moved on,
Like one from a burning grave;

And we dared not think it a real thing,

But for the rustling wave.

The sun just lingered in our view,
From the burning edge of ocean,
When by our bark that bright one passed
With a deep, disturbing motion:
The far down waters shrank away,
With a gurgling rush upheaving,
And the lifted waves grew pale and sad,
Their mother's bosom leaving.

Yet, as it passed our bending stern,
In its throne-like glory going,

It crushed on a hidden rock, and turned
Like an empire's overthrowing.

The uptorn waves rolled hoar, and huge,
The far-thrown undulations

Swelled out in the sun's last, lingering smile,
And fell like battling nations.

Hymn.-J. PIERPONT.

BORNE by the tempest, on we sail

O'er ocean's billowy way;

One glorious orb by day we hail,

By night one faithful ray.

Thus God his undivided light

Pours on life's troubled wave;

Thus hope, meek star, through death's still night,
Looks on the Christian's grave.

Monarch of heaven, Eternal One,
On thee our spirit calls;
To thee, as followers of thy Son,
We consecrate these walls.

These arches, springing to the sky,
This lightly swelling dome,
That lifts to heaven its starry eye,—
Be these, O God, thy home.

And wilt thou, Omnipresent, deign
Within these walls to dwell?-
Then shalt thou hear our holiest strain,
Our organ's proudest swell.

Devotion's eye shall drink the light
That richly gushes through
Our simple dome of spotless white,
From thine, of cloudless blue.

And Faith, and Penitence, and Love,
And Gratitude, shall bend

To thee:-O hear them from above,
Our Father and our Friend.

The Bride.-ANONYMOUS.

IT hath passed, my daughter; fare thee well!
Pledged is the faith, inscribed the vow;
Yet let these gushing tear-drops speak,
Of all thy mother's anguish now;
And when, on distant, stranger-shores,
Love beams from brighter eyes than mine,
When other hands thy tresses weave,
And other lips are pressed to thine,—

O, then remember her who grieves
With parent-fondness for her child;
Whose lonely path, of thee bereft,

Is like some desert, lone and wild,
Where erst a simple floweret grew,
Where erst one timid wild bird sung;
Now lonely, dark and desolate,

No bird nor flower its shades among.

And when thy children climb the knee,
And whisper, "Mother, mother dear!"
O, then the thought of her recall

Thou leavest broken-hearted here;
And as their sinless offerings rise

To God's own footstool, let them crave
A blessing on her memory,

Who slumbers in the peaceful grave.

When care shall dim thy sunny eye,
And, one by one, the ties are broken
That bind thee to the earth, this kiss
Will linger yet-thy mother's token;
'Twill speak her changeless love for thee,
Speak what she strives in vain to tell,
The yearning of a parent's heart-

My only child, farewell! farewell!

On seeing an Eagle pass near me in Autumn Twilight.

G. MELLEN.

SAIL on, thou lone imperial bird,

Of quenchless eye and tireless wing;
How is thy distant coming heard

As the night's breezes round thee ring!
Thy course was 'gainst the burning sun
In his extremest glory! How!
Is thy unequalled daring done,

Thou stoop'st to earth so lowly now?

Or hast thou left thy rocking dome,
Thy roaring crag, thy lightning pine,
To find some secret, meaner home,
Less stormy and unsafe than thine?

Else why thy dusky pinions bend
So closely to this shadowy world,
And round thy scorching glances send,
As wishing thy broad pens were furled?

Yet lonely is thy shattered nest,
Thy eyry desolate, though high;
And lonely thou, alike, at rest,
Or soaring in thy upper sky.
The golden light that bathes thy plumes,
On thine interminable flight,

Falls cheerless on earth's desert tombs,

And makes the North's ice-mountains bright.

So come the eagle-hearted down,

So come the proud and high to earth,
When life's night-gathering tempests frown
Over their glory and their mirth;

So quails the mind's undying eye,

That bore unveiled fame's noontide sun;

So man seeks solitude, to die,

His high place left, his triumphs done.

So, round the residence of power,
A cold and joyless lustre shines,
And on life's pinnacles will lower

Clouds dark as bathe the eagle's pines
But O, the mellow light that pours

From God's pure throne-the light that saves!

It warms the spirit as it soars,

And sheds deep radiance round our graves.

To the Hon. Theodore Frelinghuysen, on reading his eloquent Speech in defence of Indian Rights.— W L. GARRISON.

Ir unto marble statues thou hadst spoken,
Or icy hearts, congealed by polar years,
The strength of thy pure eloquence had broken,
Its generous heat had melted them to tears;
Which pearly drops had been a rainbow token,
Bidding the red men soothe their gloomy fears.

If Honor, Justice, Truth, had not forsaken

The place long hallowed as their bright abode, The faith of treaties never had been shaken,

Our country would have kept the trust she owed; Nor Violence nor Treachery had taken

Away those rights which nature's God bestowed.

Fruitless thy mighty efforts-vain appealing
To grasping Avarice, that ne'er relents;
To Party Power, that shamelessly is stealing,
Banditti-like; whatever spoil it scents;
To base Intrigue, his cloven foot revealing,
That struts in Honesty's habiliments.

Our land-once green as Paradise-is hoary,
E'en in its youth, with tyranny and crime;
Its soil with blood of Afric's sons is gory,

Whose wrongs eternity can tell-not time;
The red man's woes shall swell the damning story,
To be rehearsed in every age and clime.

Yet, FRELINGHUYSEN, gratitude is due thee,
And loftier praise than language can supply:
Guilt may denounce, and Calumny pursue thee,
And pensioned Impudence thy worth decry;
Brilliant and pure posterity shall view thee,
As a fair planet in a troublous sky.

Be not dismayed. On God's own strength relying,
Stand boldly up, meek soldier of the cross;

For thee, ten thousand prayers are heavenward flying;
Thy soul is purged from earthly rust and dross.
Patriot and Christian, ardent, self-denying,
How could we bear resignedly thy loss?

Genius Slumbering.—PERCIVAL.

HE sleeps, forgetful of his once bright fame;
He has no feeling of the glory gone;
He has no eye to catch the mounting flame,
That once in transport drew his spirit on;
He lies in dull, oblivious dreams, nor cares
Who the wreathed laurel bears.

« PreviousContinue »