Forgot their duty, and shifting sail,

Steered to the treacherous music's fall; Ah! better have battled the sharpest gale, Than lent the ear to the Sirens' call.

For, bleaching bare on the cold, white sand,
Lo! countless victims, who bent an oar

From the safe, strong waves, to the false, fair land,

And perished there on the cruel shore.

You say no longer the Sirens sing,

And cheat the souls of the sons of men; That over life's breakers no harp-notes ring With perilous sweetness fraught, as when In the gray, dim dawn of the waking world

The sailors leaned from the decks to hear Those wooing strains, till their flag they furled, And sped to the tempters who cost them dear.

Be not too sure! Till the lips are dumb,

And the brow is chill in the damp of death, There are always Sirens to overcome,

And their tones are sweet as a bugle's breath.

Who faints and falters, in heart and hand,
When nights are dreary and storms are cold,
Who hears, as if by the zephyrs fanned,
False love-notes blown, as in days of old,
Who barters his hope of the peace of God
For a present ease, a delusive rest,
Is treading the path that is always trod
By feet astray from the steadfast best.

And the mocking Sirens, who comb their locks
And weave their charms for the foolish heart
Till it breaks itself on the sunken rocks,
Still smile and sing with a fatal art.

Who spends his money before 'tis earned;
Who covets the splendor he cannot buy;
Who silently listens when good is spurned;
For the coin of honor, who gives a lie;

Who, weak of armor, does not endure,
When the conflict deepens, and wounds are
felt;

The man, whose soul is no longer pure

As when at his mother's knee he knelt,

Has heard where the white-caps kiss the reef,
The baleful strain that the Sirens sing;

Though his joy be bright, it shall still be brief,
And the hateful harps shall his death-knell

ring.

You may stop your ears as you sail along,

And drift away from their misty coast; Or better still, you may lift a song

That is sweeter than theirs, for all their boast.
That song shall soar to the heights above,
And thence, like a silver star, shall fall
To hearken and cheer, with tones of love,
All souls that list to its dulcet call.

In vain do the Sirens sing for one
Whose spirit is tuned to higher praise,
And who meekly fills, with duties done,
The rounded spheres of life's common days.
Margaret E. Sangster, in "Good Cheer."

THE CONVICT SHIP.

He stood upon the emerald strand,
Which gave his sires a kingly birth,
An exile from his native land,

A sentenced wanderer o'er the earth.
No, not the earth! or he had found
A spot where free-born souls could dwell.

Like common felons, he was bound
A slave beyond the ocean's swell-
The slave of England's haughty power—
A branded convict by the laws—
The hero of one glorious hour-
The martyr of a deathless cause.

Away upon the shadowy stream

A prison ship, with spectral shrouds, Like phantom vessel, in a dream,

Floated between the waves and clouds; And friends looked sternly on the deep, For kindred blood rose wild and high.

And grief so proud it might not weep,
Burned fiercely in each lurid eye;

Thus, stung with grief and mute with rage,
That band drew close to where he stood,
The victim of a faithless age,

Sublime in their firm brotherhood.

"Advance!" The fatal word is given;
A sob goes swelling through the crowd;
He lifts his trembling hands to heaven;
His voice is mournful, deep, and loud.

O God! I sought but to be free! If the deep bondage of this land Hay centre all its ills on me,

Then let me perish where I stand! "he blood of many a kingly sire Has reddened on my native sod; 'he light of many a martyr's fire Has sent its life-smoke up to God!

And I, her son, was it a crime

To seize the chains that mar her breast, nd scatter back the wrongs that Time Has rusted round her emerald crest?

A crime! While Ireland in her chains Against oppression toils and strives, Cach ruddy drop within my veins,— Though vital with a thousand lives,-et forth by this too willing hand If that could rend one link apart, hould redden down this thirsty sand, The old wine of a broken heart. reland, my country, what is she? And what am I? A convict slave! n hour, and that remorseless sea Will bear me to a felon's grave." Onward!" The guards file slowly past; His pulse beats like a muffled knell; s dead leaves in the wintry blast, His lifted hands unlocked, and fell.

But hark! A tumult in the crowd-
Murmurs of anguish and surprise;

For onward, like a drifting cloud,
That from a tempest wildly flies,-
The wife appears! A little child

Lies struggling in her firm embrace,
And lifts his eyes so wide and wild,
In terror, to her pallid face.

She knows not that her brow is bare,

Nor feels the moist wind wander through The golden splendor of her hair,

That shades those eyes of burning blue— Nor heeds the boy, but firmer girds

His cries and struggles to her heart. She utters neither groan nor words,

But, with white cheek and lips apart, Moves slowly through the breathless throng, That yields, with sympathy profound,

A passage, as she glides along

In search of that brave outward bound.

The convict sees her on the strand;
With one great pang of more than joy,
He turns upon the soldiers' band:
"Stop! Yonder are my wife and boy!"
Then, like a panther from its glade,

He braves the bayonets' deadly clash,
And flings aside each gleaming blade
With a fierce bound and lightning dash.
She sees him. Like a wounded doe,
All wild with bliss and mad with pain,

Springs to his arms: "I go-I go!
What power shall part us two again?