To Thee shall Age, with snowy hair,
And Strength and Beauty, bend the knee,
And Childhood lisp, with reverent air,
Its praises and its prayers to Thee.
O Thou, to whom, in ancient time,
The lyre of prophet bards was strung,
To Thee, at last, in every clime,
Shall temples rise, and praise be sung.
The Sleeper.-COMMERCIAL ADVERTISER.
IT was the spring-time in its earliest hour:
Few blossoms then had of the year been born;
The fresh winds whispered to the unfolding flower,
Where nestled dews of the unsullied morn:
Songs like to Eden's sweetened all the air,
And birds and brooks their hymns together blent; Those in the heavens and these on earth were fair: These midst the flowers, those in their incense went.
My little cousin had been roaming then,
At early dawn, along the upland side;
O'er dewy slope, green lawn, and shaded glen,
Standing by sister blossoms, side by side;
And, wearied with the pleasant tour, returned,
Upon her couch the sinless wanderer lay;
And sleep had won her, with sweet visions, earned
By radiant scenes upon that early day.
Her fair cheek pressed her pillow; in her hair,
Her darkly golden hair, some buds reposed;
And silken lashes, o'er her blue eyes fair,
In a faint glimpse the hue beneath disclosed:
A pure white rose was in her fairy hand;
And, gazing on her with a tearful eye,
"Dear one," I said, " on youth's enchanted land,
Be ever thus, beneath a cloudless sky,
Till, a pure flower of heaven, thou art removed on high.
God's Omnipresent Agency.-CARLOS WILCOX.
How desolate were nature, and how void
Of every charm, how like a naked waste
Of Africa, were not a present God
Beheld employing, in its various scenes,
His active might to animate and adorn!
What life and beauty, when, in all that breathes,
Or moves, or grows, his hand is viewed at work!-
When it is viewed unfolding every bud,
Each blossom tinging, shaping every leaf,
Wafting each cloud that passes o'er the sky,
Rolling each billow, moving every wing
That fans the air, and every warbling throat
Heard in the tuneful woodlands! In the least,
As well as in the greatest of his works,
Is ever manifest his presence kind;
As well in swarms of glittering insects, seen
Quick to and fro, within a foot of air,
Dancing a merry hour, then seen no more,
As in the systems of resplendent worlds,
Through time revolving in unbounded space.
His eye, while comprehending in one view
The whole creation, fixes full on me;
As on me shines the sun with his full blaze,
While o'er the hemisphere he spreads the same.
His hand, while holding oceans in its palm,
And compassing the skies, surrounds my life,
Guards the poor rush-light from the blast of death.
"Mea patria, vale!"
"My native land, good night!”—
My native land, adieu, adieu !
My course is o'er the sea:
I sail upon the waters blue,
Far, far away from thee:
Those scenes, to youth and hope so dear,
Which active childhood know,
Demand my last, my parting tear;
My native land, adieu !-
My native land, adieu, adien!
My course is o'er the sea:
And yet a heart more fond, more true,
Sure never beat for thee!
O, I have joyed to see thy power,
Have wept thy crimes to view;
Affection claims my parting hour:
My native land, adieu!
My native land, adieu, adieu!
My course is o'er the sea:
Though distant climes I sail to view,
Still memory turns to thee :
There, crowned with health, with peace and love
My early moments flew ;
Sure these my fond affection prove:
My native land, adieu!
My native land, adieu, adieu!
My course is o'er the sea:
O, would that Heaven would guide me through,
And lead me back to thee!
But no,-a warning voice declares
My years my days are few:
I go-be thine my ardent prayers:
My native land, adieu!
Sunrise on the Hills.-ANONYMOUS.
I STOOD upon the hills, when heaven's wide arch
Was glorious with the sun's returning march,
And woods were brightened, and soft gales
Went forth to kiss the sun-clad vales.
The clouds were far beneath me; bathed in light,
They gathered midway round the wooded height,
And in their fading glory shone
Like hosts in battle overthrown
As many a pinnacle, with shifting glance,
Through the gray mist thrust up its shattered lance,
And, rocking on the cliff, was left
The dark pine, blasted, bare and cleft.
The veil of cloud was lifted; and below
Glowed the rich valley, and the river's flow
Was darkened by the forest shade,
Or glistened in the white cascade,
Where upward, in the mellow blush of day,
The noisy bittern wheeled his spiral way.
I heard the distant waters dash;
I heard the current whirl and flash;
And richly, by the blue lake's silver beach,
The woods were bending with a silent reach.
Then o'er the vale, with gentle swell,
The music of the village bell
Came sweetly to the echo-giving hills,
And the wild horn, whose voice the woodland fills,
Was ringing to the merry shout
That, faint and far, the glen sent out;
Where, answering to the sudden shot, thin smoke
Through thick-leaved branches from the dingle broke.
If thou art worn and hard beset
With sorrows that thou wouldst forget-
If thou wouldst read a lesson that will keep
Thy heart from fainting, and thy soul from sleep-
Go to the woods and hills!-no tears
Dim the sweet look that Nature wears.
Lines on passing the Grave of my Sister.-
MICAH P. FLINT.
ON yonder shore, on yonder shore,
Now verdant with the depth of shade,
Beneath the white-armed sycamore,
There is a little infant laid.
Forgive this tear. A brother weeps.
'Tis there the faded floweret sleeps.
She sleeps alone, she sleeps alone,
And summer's forests o'er her wave;
And sighing winds at autumn moan
Around the little stranger's grave,
As though they murmured at the fate
Of one so lone and desolate.
In sounds that seem like Sorrow's own,
Their funeral dirges faintly creep;
Then, deep'ning to an organ tone,
In all their solemn cadence sweep,
And pour, unheard, along the wild,
Their desert anthem o'er a child.
She came, and passed. Can I forget,
How we, whose hearts had hailed her birth, Ere three autumnal suns had set,
Consigned her to her mother Earth!
Joys and their memories pass away;
But griefs are deeper traced than they.
We laid her in her narrow cell,
We heaped the soft mould on her breast,
And parting tears, like rain-drops, fell
Upon her lonely place of rest.
May angels guard it ;-may they bless
Her slumbers in the wilderness.
She sleeps alone, she sleeps alone;
For, all unheard, on yonder shore,
The sweeping flood, with torrent moan,
At evening lifts its solemn roar,
As, in one broad, eternal tide,
Its rolling waters onward glide.
There is no marble monument,
There is no stone, with graven lie,
To tell of love and virtue blent
In one almost too good to die.
We needed no such useless trace
To point us to her resting place.
She sleeps alone, she sleeps alone;
But, midst the tears of April showers,
The genius of the wild hath strown
His germs of fruits, his fairest flowers,
And cast his robe of vernal bloom,
In guardian fondness, o'er her tomb.
She sleeps alone, she sleeps alone;
But yearly is her grave-turf dressed,
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