When his fell'd poplars gave no further shade,
And low on earth the blackbird's nest was laid;
When in a desert sunshine, bare and blank,
Lay the green field and river's mossy bank;
And melody of bird or branch no more

The ear which wooes its sameness! How, when
Death

Hath stopp'd with ruthless hand some precious
breath,

The memory of the voice he hath destroy'd

Rose with the breeze that swept along the shore? Lives in our souls, as in an aching void!

How, through the varying fate of after-years,

"Few are the hearts, (nor theirs of kindliest When stifled sorrow weeps but casual tears,

frame,)

On whom fair Nature holds not such a claim;
And oft, in after-life, some simple thing-
A bank of primroses in early spring-
The tender scent which hidden violets yield-
The sight of cowslips in a meadow-field-
Or young laburnum's pendant yellow chain-
May bring the favourite play-place back again!
Our youthful mates are gone; some dead, some
changed,

If some stray tone seem like the voice we know,
The heart leaps up with answer faint and true!
Greeting again that sweet, long-vanish'd sound,
As, in earth's nooks of ever-haunted ground,
Strange accident, or man's capricious will,
Wakes the lone echoes and they answer still!

'Oh! what a shallow fable cheats the age, When the lost lover, on the motley stage, Wrapp'd from his mistress in some quaint disWith whom that pleasant spot was gladly ranged; Deceives her ears, because he cheats her eyes! guise, Ourselves, perhaps, more alter'd e'en than theyRather, if all could fade which charm'd us first,But there still blooms the blossom-showering If, by some magic stroke, some plague-spot cursed,

May

There still along the hedge-row's verdant line
The linnet sings, the thorny brambles twine;
Still in the copse a troop of merry elves
Shout-the gay image of our former selves;
And still, with sparkling eyes and eager hands,
Some rosy urchin high on tiptoe standз,
And plucks the ripest berries from the bough-
Which tempts a different generation now!

All outward semblance left the form beloved
A wreck unrecognised, and half disproved,
At the dear sound of that familiar voice
Her waken'd heart should tremble and rejoice,
Leap to its faith at once,-and spurn the doubt
Which, on such showing, barr'd his welcome out!

"And if even words are sweet, what, what is
song,

When lips we love, the melody prolong?

"What though no real beauty haunt that spot, How thrills the soul, and vibrates to that lay,
By graver minds beheld and noticed not?
Can we forget that once to our young eyes
It wore the aspect of a paradise?

No; still around its hallowed precinct lives
The fond mysterious charm that memory gives;
The man recals the feelings of the boy,
And clothes the meanest flower with freshness
and with joy.

Swells with the glorious sound, or dies away!
How, to the cadence of the simplest words
That ever hung upon the wild harp's chords,
The breathless heart lies listening; as it felt
All life within it on that music dwelt,
And hush'd the beating pulse's rapid power
By its own will, for that enchanted hour!

Ay! then to those who love the science well,
Music becomes a passion and a spell!
Music, the tender child of rudest times,
The gentle native of all lands and climes;
Who hymns alike man's cradle and his grave,
Lulls the low cot, or peals along the nave;
Cheers the poor peasant, who his native hills
With wild Tyrolean echoes sweetly fills;
Inspires the Indian's low monotonous chant,
Weaves skilful melodies for luxury's haunt;
And still, through all these changes, lives the

same,

Spirit without a home, without a name,
Coming, where all is discord, strife, and sin,
To prove some innate harmony within
With the dim vision of an unknown rest!
Our listening souls; and lull the heaving breast

"But, dearest child, though many a joy be
given

By the pure bounty of all-pitying Heaven,"Yes! sweet the voice of those we loved! the Though sweet emotions in our hearts have birth,

tone

Which cheers our memory as we sit alone,
And will not leave us; the o'er-mastering force,
Whose under-current's strange and hidden course
Bids some chance word, by colder hearts forgot,
Return and still return-yet weary not

As flowers are spangled on the lap of earth,-
Though, with the flag of hope and triumph hung
High o'er our heads, we start when life is young,
And onward cheer'd, by sense, and sight, and
sound,

Like a launch'd bark, we enter with a bound,

THE DREAM.

To feel the blow which time should make less keen
Increase its burden each successive day,-
To need good counsel, and to miss the voice,
The ever trusted, and the ever true,
Whose tones were wont to cheer our faltering
choice,

And show what holy virtue bade us do,-
To bear deep wrong and bow the widow'd head
In helpless anguish, no one to defend;
Or worse, in lieu of him, the kindly dead,
Claim faint assistance from some lukewarm
friend,-

Yet scarce perceive the extent of all our loss

By every hope that cheer'd thine earlier day-
By every tear that washes wrath away-
By every old remembrance long gone by-
By every pang that makes thee yearn to die;
And learn at length how deep and stern a blow
Near hands can strike, and yet no pity show.

"Oh! weak to suffer, savage to inflict,

Is man's commingling nature; hear him now
Some transient trial of his life depict,

Hear him in holy rites a suppliant bow;
See him shrink back from sickness and from pain
And in his sorrow to his God complain;

Till the fresh tomb be green with gathering moss-Remit my trespass, spare my sin,' he cries,
Till many a morn have met our sadden'd eyes
With none to say
Good morrow ;"-many

an eve

Send its red glory through the tranquil skies,
Each bringing with it deeper cause to grieve!

"This is a destiny which may be thine-
The common grief: God will'd it should be mine:
Short was the course our happy love had run,
And hard it was to say Thy will be done!'

"Yet those whom man, not God, hath parted, know

A heavier pang, a more enduring woe;

No softening memory mingles with their tears,
Still the wound rankles on through dreary years,
Still the heart feels, in bitterest hours of blame,
It dares not curse the long-familiar name;
Still, vainly free, through many a cheerless day,
From weaker ties turns helplessly away,
Sick for the smiles that bless'd its home of yore,
The natural joys of life that come no more;
And, all bewildered by the abyss, whose gloom
Dark and impassable as is the tomb,

Lies stretch'd between the future and the past,
Sinks into deep and cold despair at last.

'All-merciful, Almighty, and All-wise;
Quench this affliction's bitter whelming tide,
Draw out thy barbed arrow from my side:'-
-And rises from that mockery of prayer
To hale some brother-debtor to despair!

"May this be spared thee! Yet be sure, my
child,

(Howe'er that dream thy fancy hath beguiled,)
Some sorrow lurks to cloud thy future fate;
Thy share of tears,-come early or come late,-
Must still be shed; and 'twere as vain a thing
To ask of Nature one perpetual spring
As to evade those sad autumnal hours,
Or deem thy path of life should bloom, all flow.
ers."

She ceased: and that fair maiden heard the
truth

With the fond passionate despair of youth,
In outward signs and bursts of wild lament :-
Which, new to suffering, gives its sorrow vent

"If this be so, then, mother, let me die
Let me die young; before the holy trust
Ere yet the glow hath faded from my sky!

In human kindness crumbles into dust;
Before I suffer what I have not earn'd,

"Heaven give thee poverty, disease, or death, Or see by treachery my truth return'd;

Each varied ill that waits on human breath,

Rather than bid thee linger out thy life
In the long toil of such unnatural strife.
To wander through the world unreconciled,
Heart weary as a spirit-broken child,

And think it were an hour of bliss like heaven
If thou could'st die-forgiving and forgiven,-
Or with a feverish hope, of anguish born,
(Nerving thy mind to feel indignant scorn
Of all the cruel foes who 'twixt ye stand,
Holding the heartstrings with a reckless hand,)
Steal to his presence, now unseen so long,
And claim his mercy who hath dealt the wrong!
Into the aching depths of thy poor heart

Dive, as it were, even to the roots of pain,
And wrench up thoughts that tear thy soul apart,
And burn like fire through thy bewilder'd brain.
Clothe them in passionate words of wild appeal
To teach thy fellow-creature how to feel,-
Pray, weep, exhaust thyself in maddening tears,-
Recall the hopes, the influences of years,-
Kneel, dash thyself upon the senseless ground,
Writhe as the worm writhes with dividing
wound,-

Invoke the heaven that knows thy sorrow's truth,
By all the softening memories of youth-

:

Before the love I live for, fades away;
Before the hopes I cherish'd most, decay;
Before the withering touch of fearful change
Makes some familiar face look cold and strange,
Or some dear heart, close knitted to my own,
By perishing, hath left me more alone!
Though death be bitter, I can brave its pain
Better than all which threats if I remain :
While my soul, freed from ev'ry chance of ill,
Soars to that God whose high mysterious will
Sent me, foredoom'd to grief, with wandering feet,
To grope my way through all this fair deceit !"

Her parent heard the words with grieved amaze,
And thus return'd, with calm reproving gaze :-

"Blaspheme not Heaven with rash impatien!
speech,

Nor deem, at thine own hour, its rest to reach,
Unhappy child! The full appointed time

Is His to choose; and when the sullen chime,
And deep-toned striking of the funeral bell,
Thy fate to earthly ears shall sadly tell,
Oh! may the death thou talk'st of as a boon,
Find thee prepared,-
-nor come even then toc

soon!

THE DREAM.

"True, ere thou meet'st that long and dream-
less sleep,

Thy heart must ache-thy weary eyes must weep:
It is our human lot! The fairest child
That e'er on loving mother brightly smiled,-
Most watch'd, most tended-ere his eyelids close
Hath had his little share of infant woes,
And dies familiar with a sense of grief,
Though for all else his life hath been too brief!
But shall we therefore, murmuring against God,
Question the justice of his chastening rod,
And look to earthly joys as though they were
The prize immortal souls were given to share?

"Oh! were such joys and this vain world alone
The term of human hope-where, where would
be

The victims of some tyranny unknown,
Who sank, still conscious that the mind was free?
'They that have lain in dungeons years on years,
No voice to cheer their darkness,-they whose
pain

Of horrid torture wrung forth blood with tears,
Murder'd, perhaps, for some rapacious gain,―
They who have stood, bound to the martyr's stake,
While the sharp flames ate through the blister-
ing skin,-

They that have bled for some high cause's sake,-
They that have perish'd for another's sin,
And from the scaffold to that God appeal'd
To whom the naked heart is all reveal'd,
Against the shortening of life's narrow span
By the blind rage and false decree of man?
And where obscurer sufferers-they who slept

273

Man's proud mistaken judgments and false scorn
Shall melt like mists before the uprising morn,
And holy truth stand forth serenely bright,
In the rich flood of God's eternal light!

"Then shall the Lazarus of the carth have

rest

The rich man judgment—and the grieving breast
Deep peace for ever. Therefore look thou not
So much to what on earth shall be thy lot,
As to thy fate hereafter,-to that day
When like a scroll this world shall pass away,
And what thou here hast done, or here enjoy'd,
Import but to thy soul:-all else destroy'd!

"And have thou faith in human nature still;
Though evil thoughts abound, and acts of ill;
Though innocence in sorrow shrouded be,
And tyranny's strong step walk bold and frec!
For many a kindly generous deed is done
Which leaves no record underneath the sun,-
Self-abnegating love and humble worth,
Which yet shall consecrate our sinful earth!
He that deals blame, and yet forgets to praise,
Who sets brief storms against long summer-days.
Hath a sick judgment. Shall the usual joy
Be all forgot, and nought our minds employ,
Through the long course of ever-varying years.
But temporary pain and casual tears?

And shall we all condemn, and all distrust,
Because some men are false and some unjust?
Forbid it Heaven! far better 'twere to be
Dupe of the fond impossibility

Of light and radiance which thy vision gave

And left no name on history's random page,-Than thus to live suspicion's bitter slave.

But in God's book of reckoning, sternly kept,
Live on from year to year, from age to age?
The poor-the labouring poor! whose weary lives,
Through many a freezing night and hungry day,
Are a reproach to him who only strives

In luxury to waste his hours away,-
The patient poor! whose insufficient means
Make sickness dreadful, yet by whose low bed
Oft in meek prayers some fellow-sufferer leans,
And trusts in Heaven while destitute of bread;
The workhouse orphan, left without a friend;
Or weak forsaken child of want and sin,
Whose helpless life begins, as it must end,
By men disputing who shall take it in;
Who clothe, who aid that spark to linger here,
Which for mysterious purpose God hath given
To struggle through a day of toil and fear,
And meet him-with the proudest-up in Hea-
ven !

Give credit to thy mortal brother's heart
For all the good that in thine own hath part,
And, cheerfully as honest prudence may,
Trust to his proffer'd hand's protecting stay:
For God, who made this teeming earth so full,
And made the proud dependent on the dull-
The strong upon the weak-thereby would show
One common bond should link us all below.

"And visit not with a severer scorn Faults, whose deep root was with our nature born From which-though others woo'd thee just as

vain

Thou, differently tempted, didst abstain:
Nor dwell on points of creed-assuming right
To judge how holy in his Maker's sight
Is he who at a different altar bends;

For hence have risen the bitterest feuds of friends,
The wildest wars of nations; age on age

These were, and are not:-shall we therefore Hath desecrated thus dark history's page;
deem

That they have vanish'd like a sleeper's dream?
Or that one half creation is to know
Luxurious joy, and others only woe,
And so go down into the common tomb,
With none to question their unequal doom?
Shall we give credit to a thought so fond?
Ah! no-the world beyond-the world beyond!
There, shall the desolate heart regain its own!
There, the oppress'd shall stand before God's
throne !

There, when the tangled web is all explain'd,
Wrong suffer'd, pain inflicted, grief disdain'd,
VOL. III.-18

And still (though not, perhaps, with fire and
sword)

Reckless we raise 'The banner of the Lord!'
Mock Heaven's calm mercy by the plea we make.
That all is done for gentle Jesus' sake,-
Disturb the consciences of weaker men,—
Employ the scholar's art, the bigot's pen,-
And rouse the wrathful and the spirit-proud
To language bitter, vehement, and loud,
Whose unconvincing fury wounds the ear,
And seeking, with some sharp and haughty sneer
How best the opposing party may be stting,-
Pleads for religion with a devil's tongue!