I tread where the TWELVE in their wayfaring trod; Oh, here with His flock the sad Wanderer came,- And throned on her hills sits Jerusalem yet, But with dust on her forehead, and chains on her feet; But wherefore this dream of the earthly abode Not in clouds and in terrors, but gentle as when, In love and in meekness, He moved among men; And what if my feet may not tread where He stood, Nor my eyes see the cross which He bowed Him to bear, Yet, Loved of the Father, Thy Spirit is near Oh, the outward hath gone!—but, in glory and power, SONG OF THE FREE. Living, I shall assert the right of FREE DISCUSSION; dying, I shall assert it; and, should I leave no other inheritance to my children, by the blessing of God I will leave them the inheritance of FREE PRINCIPLES, and the example of a manly and independent defence of them."-Daniel Webster. PRIDE of New England! Soul of our fathers! Shrink we all craven-like, What though the tempest be Where's the New Englander Shamefully cowering? Around us are lying, Free were the sleepers all, Back with the Southerner's Winds, clouds, and waters Haste we, and summon Manhood and woman! Deep let our pledges be: If we have whisper'd truth, Truce with Oppression, Never, oh! never! LINES ON A PORTRAIT. HOW beautiful! That brow of snow, Which on the temple's light reposes- Contrasted with the cheek's pure roses! There, as she sits beneath the shade By vine and rose-wreath'd arbor made, Tempering the light which, soft and warm Reveals her full and matchless form, In thoughtful quietude, she seems Like one of Raphael's pictur'd dreams, Where blend in one all radiant face The woman's warmth-the angel's grace! Well-I can gaze upon it now, As on some cloud of autumn's even, Bathing its pinions in the glow And glory of the sunset heavenSo holy and so far away That love without desire is cherish'd, I know her not. And what is all The tones I love my ear has met; The smiles I love are lingering yet! Oh, who would leave these tokens tried For all the stranger-world beside? Alfred B. Street. A FOREST WALK. A LOVELY sky, a cloudless sun, A wind that breathes of leaves and flowers, O'er hill, through dale, my steps have won, To the cool forest's shadowy bowers; One of the paths all round that wind, Traced by the browsing herds, I choose, And sights and sounds of human kind In Nature's lone recesse: lose. The beech displays its marbled bark, The spruce its green tent stretches wide, All weave on high a verdant roof, Making a twilight soft and green Sweet forest-odours have their birth From the clothed boughs and teeming earth: Where pine-cones dropped, leaves piled and dead, Long tufts of grass, and stars of fern, With many a wild flower's fairy urn, A thick, elastic carpet spread; Here, with its mossy pall, the trunk, Resolving into soil, is sunk; There, wrenched but lately from its throne, By some fierce whirlwind circling past, Its huge roots masse with earth and stone. One of the woodland kings is cast. |