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"Rememberest thou the boding fears

That drench'd thy cheek with a flood of tears,
When I left my home to tread the deck?
Yet I'm safe and well, and fear no wreck ;-
The fever hath pass'd and left me free,

It hath thinned our crew but scathed not me.

"Health hath breathed on our ship again,
Gaily we scud o'er the watery plain ;-
Gaily, for now we are homeward bound,
Soon we shall leap upon English ground:
Joy, joy, my dear Mother, for me and you;
Till Christmas merry,-adieu! adieu !"

Christmas approacheth- is here--is gone,
But where is the long-expected one?

Round the hearth his childhood's playmates meet,-
Where is the friend they had hoped to greet?

Mother, his wanderings aye are o'er;

Friends, he will meet ye on earth no more.

Buoyant and fearless of future ill,
Dreaming happiness waited his will;
With step elastic and hope-lit eye

He paced the deck,—his pulse beat high;
But the scorching breath of fever pass'd,
And life-blood shrank from the burning blast.

Homeward he fled to the better shore,

The toilsome voyage of life is o'er :

He sleeps the sleep of the dreamless dead,
A sea-weed pillow beneath his head;
The rest he sought his spirit found, --
Mother, thy wept one was Homeward Bound!

THE CONTENTED SPOUSE.

DAVID WILLIAM PAYNTER; DIED NEAR MANCHESTER, MARCH 15, 1823.

WHILE striplings sigh in sugar'd verse,

Invoking sylph and fairy,

A husband, surely, may rehearse

The love he bears to MARY.

No puling vows he'll e'er employ,
To prove his passion chary;
Nor e'er with fiction's dross alloy
The praise he gives to MARY.

At home, abroad, in joy, or grief,
Her heart is ever wary;

Who yields not to this truth belief,

Does wrong to him and MARY.

Let courtly fools their vain intrigues
Pursue, with license airy;

He fondly boasts no amorous leagues,
But those he keeps with MARY.

Five years, she now hath been his wife,
Whose faith will never vary;

But whilst he holds ose spark of life,
That spark shall burn for MARY,

HE WAS TOO BEAUTIFUL TO LIVE.

FROM "IRWELL, AND OTHER POEMS," BY JOSEPH ANTHONY, 1843.

My brother was a lovely child,

His beauty language may not give;
There was a something when he smiled,
All thoughts of earthly things beguiled;
To realms above, and heavenly things,
To cherubs and their golden wings,

And joys alone those realms can give-
He was too beautiful to live.

My brother oft would ask the boon,
In stilly night by me to sit,

To gaze on the resplendent moon,

Or watch huge clouds before it flit;

Or on some star his eye would rest,
And then, himself could ne'er tell why,
With deep emotion heaved his breast,
Whilst tears unconscious fill'd his eye.

And once, I do remember well,

Whilst thus his gaze intently set,
He said that he should love to dwell
Where such bright beings nightly met;
Or happy be alone to roam

Upon the bright and beauteous dome;
And then he ask'd with tearful eye,
If those bright stars did ever die ?

And in these early days he died-
He was too beautiful to live;
And years since then away have died,
And others dear are by his side;
Yet flits his form in radiance bright,
Before mine eyes in hours of night;
Sweet visions they which e'er will be,
Whilst unto me lives memory;
And oh, the joy those visions give,
Of one too beautiful to live!

THE UNFOSTERED APPLE TREE:

Which regularly blooms, but never produces fruit, probably owing to its being planted in a rough, gravelly soil.

DAVID WILLIAM PAYNTER.

In vain thou blossom'st, hapless Tree !
On thy frail boughs we ne'er shall see
The autumnal Fruit, with russet cheek,
Till thou art placed in soil more sleek.

E'en thus, while yet my Muse was young,
The bloom of hope profusely hung
About her lyre and plaintive lute,—

But ne'er could ripen into Fruit.

The preface to Mr. Paynter's volume of poems, The Muse in Idleness, is somewhat quaint and pleasing: "The heterogeneous children, disposed herein according to their respective temperaments, having lived for a considerable time, (several of them, indeed, longer than a seven-years' apprenticeship,) idle and unprofitable members of their Father's household,---are sent into the world, in order to make

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