THE SOUL'S ERRAND. BY JOSHUA SYLVESTER. Go, soul, the body's guest, Upon a thankless errand! The truth shall be thy warrant ; Go, tell the court it glows, And shines like rotten wood; Go, tell the church it shows What's good, and doth no good: If church and court reply, Then give them both the lie. Tell potentates, they live Acting by others' actions, Not strong but by their factions. Tell men of high condition, That rule affairs of state, Their purpose is ambition, Their practice only hate. And if they once reply, Give them all the lie. Tell them that brave it most, Tell zeal it lacks devotion, Tell love it is but lust, And wish them not reply, Tell age it daily wasteth, Tell honor how it alters, Tell wit how much it wrangles Tell physic of her boldness, Tell charity of coldness, So give them still the lie. Tell fortune of her blindness, Tell nature of decay, Tell friendship of unkindness, Tell justice of delay. And if they will reply, Then give them all the lie. Tell arts they have no soundness, But vary by esteeming, Tell schools they want profoundness, And stand too much on seeming. If arts and schools reply, Give arts and schools the lie. Tell faith it's fled the city, Tell how the country erreth, Tell, manhood shakes off pity, Tell, virtue least preferreth, And if they do reply, Spare not to give the lie. So, when thou hast, as I Commanded thee, done blabbing; Although to give the lie, Deserves no less than stabbing; Yet stab at thee who will, No stab the soul can kill. ETTY ROVER. BY L. E. L. Thou lovely and thou happy child, I should be glad to change our state, And yet it is a lingering joy A little monarch thou art there, Thy world is in thy own glad will, And in thy unused heart, which makes With no misgivings in thy past, Thy future with no fear; An angel's atmosphere. How little is the happiness, A word will fill the little heart That such can be denied. And yet how many weary hours Those joyous creatures know; How much of sorrow and restraint They to their elders owe! How much they suffer from our faults, We overrule, and overteach, We curb and we confine; No; only taught by love to love, Are all its brief years ask. Enjoy thy happiness, sweet child, With careless heart and eye; Enjoy those few bright hours which now, E'en now, are hurrying by. And let the gazer on thy face Grow glad with watching thee, And better, kinder-such, at least, Its influence on me. THE IRISH EMIGRANT'S LAMENT. BY MRS. BLACKWOOD. I'm sitting on the stile, Mary, The corn was springing fresh and green, The place is little changed, Mary; And the corn is green again: For the poor make no new friends; Your's was the good, brave heart, Mary, That still kept hoping on, When the trust in God had left my soul, And my arms' young strength had gone. There was comfort ever on your lip, And the kind look on your brow; I bless you Mary, for that same, I thank you for the patient smile, I bless you for the pleasant word, I'm bidding you a long farewell, And often in those grand old woods And the springing corn, and bright May morn, LOST-Yesterday, somewhere between sunrise and sunset, two golden hours, each set with sixty diamond minutes. No reward is offered, for they are gone forever. FORGIVENESS is the odor exhaled by flowers when trampled upon. PRISON DISCIPLINE. BY LYDIA MARIA CHILD. course of a month; now there are not as many hnudreds; and the conviction is constantly growing stronger, that it will be wisest, as a mere matter of policy, to dispense with coporeal punishment altogether. This is somewhat gained in the course of the eighteen centuries, which have rolled away, through rivers of human blood, since Christ said, · If thy brother offend thee, forgive him. I say unto thee not until seven times, but until seventy times seven." If our religion is not practicable, honest men ought not to profess it. A very great change has taken place in the women's department of the prison; under the firm but A Society has lately been organized here, for the Reform of Prisons and their inmates. Their first object is to introduce into our prisons such a mode of discipline as is best calculated to reform criminals, by stimulating and encouraging what remains of good within them, while they are at the same time kept under strict regulations, and guided by a firm hand. Their next object is to render discharged convicts such assistance as will be most likely to guide them into the paths of sober and successful industry. John W. Edmonds, President of the Board of Inspectors at Sing Sing Prison, pleaded for the benevo-kind administration of Mrs. Farnham, and her collent objects of the institution with real earnestness of heart; and brought forward abundant statisties, carefully prepared, to show the need of such an association, and to prove that crime always diminishes in proportion to the amelioration of the laws. He urged the alarming fact that from 200 to 250 convicts a year, from Sing Sing, were returned upon society, nearly without money, without friends, (except among the vicious) without character, and without employment. Of these more than half belong to the cities of New York and Brooklyn; with out taking into account the numbers that pass through, and often stop for a season, on their way to other destinations. Poor, unfriended, discour aged, and despised, in a state of hostility with the world, which often has in reality done them more grievous wrong than they have done the world, how terribly powerful must be the temptation to new crimes! In answer to the common plea, that most of these wretched people were old offenders, hardened in vice and not likely to be restored by Christian efforts, he stated that of the 934 now in the prison, only 154 had been in prison before; 599 of them, about twothirds of the whole number, were under thirty years of age; 192 were under twenty-one years of age; and 27 were not seventeen years old, when they were sentenced. Of thirty-one now confirmed lunatics, twenty-two were so when they were committed. leagues, who do not discharge their arduous duties merely as a means of gaining a living, but who feel a sincere sympathy for the wretched beings intrusted to their care. The difference between their government and the old fashioned method, cannot perhaps be more concisely indicated than by the following anecdote: Two minister in the Society of Friends travelled together, and one was much more successful in his labours than the other. "How dost thou manage to take so much more hold of the hearts of the people, than I do?" said the least efficient preacher. "I can explain it in few words," replied the other: "I tell people that if they do right they shall not be whipped. Thou sayest that if they don't do right, they shall be whipped." In other words the system now begun at Sing Sing is to punish as sparingly as possible, and to give cordial praise and increase of privileges, for every indication of improvement. The wisdom of such a course was suggested to my mind several years ago, by an intelligent, well educated woman, who had, by intemperance, become an inmate of the almshouse at South Boston. "Oh!" said she, "if they would only give us more encouragement and less driving; if they would grant increased privileges for doing well, instead of threatening punishment for doing wrong; I could perform my tasks with a cheerful heart, if they would only say to me, Do your task quickly, and behave well, and you shall hear music one evening in the week, or you may have He said he had no faith whatever in the system one day of the six to read entertaining books.' But of violence, which had so long prevailed in the instead of that, it always is, If your task in not world; the system of tormenting criminals into what done well, you will be punished.' Oh! nobody, that was called good order, and of never appealing to any-has never tried it, knows how hard this makes work thing better than the base sentiment of fear. He had go off" seen enough, in his own experience, to convince him that, degraded as they were, they still had hearts that could be touched by kindness, consciences that might be aroused by appeals to reason, and aspirations for a better course of life, which often needed only the cheering voice of sympathy and hope, to be strengthened into permanent reformation. Of late there has been a gradual amelioration of discipline at Sing Sing. Three thousand lashes, with a cat of six tails, used to be inflicted in the I thought of this woman when I read Barry Cornwall's lines, called THE POOK-HOUSE: Enter and look! In the high walled yards |