Then, O my brothers, trust and love,
A golden country lies before us,
With man around us, God above,
And truth and beauty doming o'er us,
A golden country gleams before us.
From Pride shall have a Fall, a Comedy, by the Rev. Dr. CROLY.
True, lady, by the roses on those lips,
Both man and woman would find life a waste
But for the cunning of CURIOSITY!
She's the world's witch, and through the world she runs,
The merriest masker underneath the moon!
To beauties, languid from the last night's rout,
She comes with tresses loose, and shoulders wrapt
In morning shawls; and by their pillow sits
Telling delicious tales of-lovers lost,
Fair rivals jilted, scandals, smuggled lace!
And then they smile, and turn their eyes, and yawn,
And wonder what's o'clock, then sink again;
And thus she sends the pretty fools to sleep.
She comes to ancient dames-and stiff as steel,
In hood and stomacher, with snuff in hand,
She makes their rigid muscles gay with news
Of Doctors' Commons, matches broken off,
Blue-stocking frailties, cards and ratafia;
And thus she gives them prattle for the day.
She sits by ancient politicians, bowed
As if a hundred years were on her back ;
Then peering through her spectacles, she reads
A seeming journal stuff'd with monstrous tales
Of Turks and Tartars; deep conspiracies
(Born in the writer's brain); of spots in the sun,
Pregnant with fearful wars. And so they shake,
And hope they'll find the world all safe by morn.
And thus we make the world, both young and old,
Bow down to sovereign-CURIOSITY!
By EBENEZER ELLIOTT.
DROP, drop into the grave, Old Leaf,
Drop, drop into the grave;
Thy acorn's grown, thy acorn's sown—
Drop, drop into the grave.
December's tempests rave, Old Leaf!
Above thy forest-grave, Old Leaf!
Drop, drop into the grave!
The birds in spring will sweetly sing,
That death alone is sad;
The grass will grow,
That death alone is sad;
Lament above thy grave, Old Leaf!
For what has life to do with grief?
'Tis death alone that's sad.
What then? We two have both lived through The sunshine and the rain;
And bless'd be he, to me and thee,
Who sent his sun and rain !
We've had our sun and rain, Old Leaf,
And God will send again, Old Leaf,
The sunshine and the rain.
Race after race of leaves and men
Bloom, wither, and are gone;
As winds and waters rise and fall,
So life and death roll on ;
And long as ocean heaves, Old Leaf,
And bud and fade the leaves, Old Leaf,
Will life and death roll on.
How like am I to thee, Old Leaf!
We'll drop together down;
How like art thou to me, Old Leaf!
We'll drop together down.
I'm grey and thou art brown, Old Leaf!
We'll drop together down, Old Leaf!
We'll drop together down!
Drop, drop into the grave, Old Leaf,
Drop, drop into the grave:
Thy acorn's grown, thy acorn's sown-
Drop, drop into the grave.
December's tempests rave, Old Leaf,
Above thy forest-grave, Old Leaf:
Drop, drop into the grave!
THE TAPESTRIED CHAMBER.
Published anonymously in one of the Magazines.
WHEN the pine tree wears a deeper gloom,
And the twilight shadows fall,
I would not enter the tapestried room,
O' the lonely haunted hall.
Certes! a spell the spot is o'er,
For the faintest footsteps tread,
As it echoes o'er its oaken floor,
Seems a voice from the shrouded dead.
Gaunt grim heads from the corbels stare,
With fix'd unearthly look,
And a picture is there of a ladye fair,
With her eyne on an ancient book;
Seems it some tome of romances old-
And the peasants say,
A form like hers, at the midnight cold,
There wandereth to and fro !
Like the limner's sketch she, I ween, is dress'd,
And she conneth her book alway;
Ye the rustling may hear of her broidered vest,
And her robe o' the russet grey!
Oh! if met, when the spectral moonbeams smile,
By one of that feudal race,
Tolls the bell of yon pile, and the dim church aisle Is the doom'd one's resting place.
When the fire burns bright on the winter night,
And the crackling faggots blaze,
And the villagers pore on the legends hoar
That live in the minstrel lays;
Then a tale of the dead is sung and said,
That, gentle dames, I may not tell,-
For, hark! 'tis the time o' the midnight chime,
May the good saints shield us well!
THE CORNER.
By CHARLES MACKAY.
THE seat in the corner-
What comfort we see
In that type of affection,
Where love bends the knee;
When the prayers of our childhood
We learn'd to repeat,
And the lips of a mother
Made holiness sweet.
The name of a corner
Has something still dear,
That tells us of pleasures
Ne'er bought with a tear:
Of loved ones remember'd,
Of faces, once gay,
That have fled like a dream,
Like a vision away.
In our letters, full often,
Kind sayings abound;
But still in the corner
The kindest is found;
We look to the postscript,
And there, written small,
We find in the corner
Words dearer than all !
Our heart receives many
We love with good will,
But who gets the corner
Is loved the best still:
For the heart hath its corner,
And dear is the one
Who remains its possessor
Till life's love is gone.
Count not thy life by calendars; for years
Shall pass thee by unheeded, whilst an hour,
Some little fleeting hour, too quickly past,
May stamp itself so deeply on thy brain,
Thy latest years shall live upon its joy.
His life is longest ;-not whose boneless gums,
Sunk eyes, wan cheeks, and snow-white hairs bespeak
Life's limits; no! but he whose memory
Is thickest set with those delicious scenes
'Tis sweet to ponder o'er when even falls.
Cold grew the foggy morn, the day was brief,
Loose on the berry hung the crimson leaf;
The dew dwelt ever in the herb; the woods
Roar'd with strong blasts, with mighty showers the
floods :
All grief was vanish'd, save of pine and yew,
That still display'd their melancholy hue;
Save the green holly, with its berries red,
And the green moss that o'er the gravel spread.
There's music in the sighing of a reed:
There's music in the gushing of a rill:
There's music in all things, if men had ears:
Their earth is but an echo of the spheres.
But see the fading many-colour'd woods,
Shade deep'ning over shade, the country round
Imbrown; a crowded umbrage dusk and dim
Of every hue, from wan declining green
To sooty dark. These now the lonesome muse,
Low whispering, lead into their leaf-strewn walks,
And give the season in its latest view.
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