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 6 
 
 MOSS-ROSE, 
 
 A PARTING TOKEN. 
 
 Edited by 
 C. W. EVEREST. 
 
 "What! not accept my foolish flower? 
 Well, then I am indeed unblest." 
 
 GURDON ROBINS, Jr. 180 MAIN STREET. 
 1840. 
 

 Entered according to act of Congress in the year 1840, by 
 
 GURDON ROBINS, Jr. 
 in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Connecticut. 
 
 IFFA I? AND CO 
 ARL 8TKEKT 
 
ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 Wb were, some months since, requested by the 
 Publisher of the present volume, to prepare for him 
 a work which might serve as a suitable parting 
 token. The result of our effort is now submitted to 
 the public. The articles which compose it have all 
 been furnished us by our native writers, and among 
 them the reader will be pleased to recognize many 
 an old acquaintance, not unknown to fame. 
 
 " What's in a name ?" said he of Stratford-upon- 
 Avon. Yet we found much difficulty in suiting 
 ourself with one suitable for our little book. A 
 friend suggested our present title. We like it : for 
 we are a common-place lover of flowers in general, 
 and of verses in particular. But this is all. We 
 eschew all design at "blooming sentiment." We 
 are no disciple of Flora, and plead ignorant even of 
 the tender philosophy of her fair "Interpreter." 
 For flowers, literal or metaphorical, we have not 
 even a word. We left the entire subject to the pen 
 of our friend who suggested our title, and whose 
 
iV ADVERTISEMENT, 
 
 interesting article concludes our volume. The 
 reader will linger with increased and saddened in- 
 terest over it, when we say that its young and gifted 
 author is, alas ! no more ! That unfolding flower 
 of genius has been transplanted to the garden of God. 
 In conclusion, we have only to add, that we have 
 tried to please. If we shall be found to have failed, 
 the fault will prove to have arisen from our own 
 error of judgment in the design, rather than from 
 the merits of our worthy and obliging correspond- 
 ents. 
 
 Truly the Public's obedient servant, 
 
 THE EDITOR . 
 
INDEX. 
 
 To Revenge, 
 
 Anon. 
 
 Page 
 164 
 
 Sonnet, 
 
 Park Benjamin. 
 
 62 
 
 Something about flowers, 
 
 R. Bacon, jr. 
 
 171 
 
 The Early Dead, Willis Oaylord Clark. 
 
 5 
 
 Old Letters, 
 
 J. W. Dixon. 
 
 7 
 
 The Fountain of Youth, 
 
 ii « 
 
 60 
 
 Carpe Diem, 
 
 A. D. 
 
 37 
 
 The Young Mother, 
 
 M 
 
 63 
 
 The Exile's Cave, 
 
 D. E. G. 
 
 44 
 
 Tool of Bethesda, 
 
 Mary Jinn Dodd. 
 
 83 
 
 Day Dreaming, 
 
 (i <( 
 
 112 
 

 
 ] 
 
 Page 
 
 To a Cricket, 
 
 Mary Ann Dodd. 
 
 132 
 
 June, 
 
 " 
 
 (C 
 
 138 
 
 Song, 
 
 it 
 
 " 
 
 161 
 
 When in fond memory' 
 
 e magic glass, 
 
 Editor. 
 
 29 
 
 Song of the Sybil, 
 
 
 u 
 
 108 
 
 The Seasons, 
 
 
 (1 
 
 118 
 
 " Her spirit hath flown 
 
 to its rest," 
 
 M 
 
 122 
 
 Home of the Desolate, 
 
 
 " 
 
 129 
 
 The friends we loved in childhood, 
 
 « 
 
 143 
 
 The Evening Lay, 
 
 
 H 
 
 152 
 
 Sonnets to J. D. 
 
 
 u 
 
 159 
 
 November, 
 
 
 Ex— r. 
 
 31 
 
 Stanzas, 
 
 
 (i 
 
 110 
 
 The Life of Dreams, 
 
 
 Falconer. 
 
 13 
 
 The Arab Steed, 
 
 
 u 
 
 33 
 
 The Swallow, 
 
 
 « 
 
 140 
 
 Song in June, 
 
 
 « 
 
 157 
 
 My Sister, 
 
 
 " 
 
 161 
 
 The Curfew Bell, 
 
 
 « 
 
 ]79 
 
Musings— Joy, 
 
 H. Greely. 
 
 VII 
 
 Page 
 3 
 
 The unmarked graves, 
 
 U (I 
 
 41 
 
 Lines to my Sister, 
 
 M. Gardner. 
 
 136 
 
 The Departure, 
 
 u u 
 
 155 
 
 A walk in the Forest, 
 
 M. L. Gardner. 
 
 145 
 
 Power and Mercy, 
 
 W. J. Hamersley. 
 
 90 
 
 Sonnet, 
 
 ii it 
 
 41 
 
 Scene from a MS. drama, 
 
 TV. C. Hosmer. 
 
 50 
 
 The Turquoise ring, 
 
 Lucy Hooper. 
 
 148 
 
 Oneiropolia, 
 
 D. Lambert. 
 
 21 
 
 Sonnet, 
 
 Ji. P. Marvin. 
 
 168 
 
 The waterfall, 
 
 I. C. Pray. 
 
 135 
 
 The Dying Warrior, 
 
 G. M. Snow. 
 
 15 
 
 The Land, 
 
 u ii 
 
 87 
 
 Mary Stuart, 
 
 ., 
 
 116 
 
 The Moss Rose, 
 
 Mrs. Sigourney. 
 
 1 
 
 The Native Village 
 
 .. 
 
 47 
 
 The Lovers, 
 
 u u 
 
 107 
 
Summer Evening, 
 
 Rev- R. Turnbull. 
 
 Paga 
 27 
 
 Lines, 
 
 u 
 
 58 
 
 A Child at Prayer, 
 
 " 
 
 114 
 
 To Catharine, 
 
 Rev. J. D. Tyler. 
 
 65 
 
 Sonnet, 
 
 (i <t 
 
 81 
 
 A Letter from the Old Dominion, T. P. Tyler. 
 
 173 
 
 Iona— Fingal's Cave— Gianl 
 
 ;'s Causeway, 
 
 A Traveller. 
 
 53 
 
 Cemetery, 
 
 Rev. J. Williams. 
 
 17 
 
 Socrates, 
 
 B. F. Watson. 
 
 40 
 
 Clarence De Coucy, 
 
 J. T. Wait. 
 
 89 
 
 Thibault D'Auvergne, 
 
 H. Walkley. 
 
 123 
 
THE MOSS-ROSE 
 
 THE MOSS-ROSE 
 MAKING HER NEWYEAR's CALL. 
 
 BY MRS. L. H. SIGOUENEY. 
 
 "I've a call to make," said the rich Moss-Rose, 
 
 " At the house of a lady fair, 
 Cousin China-Rose, if you'll go with mo, 
 
 I'll introduce you there. 
 
 " 'Tis New- Year's day, come do not stay, 
 
 But get on your cloak and hood ; 
 You've mop'd so long by the green-house fire, 
 
 That a walk will do you good." 
 
 Then China's Yellow-Rose replied, 
 
 " You've a terrible climate, dear ; 
 It has made me old, before my time, 
 
 And bilious too, I fear ! 
 
 " But I'll put my muff and tippet on, 
 Since you needs must have me go, 
 
 And yet I'm sure I heard a blast, 
 And saw a flake of snow." 
 
 1 
 
I THE MOSS-UOSE. 
 
 The Moss-Rose wrapp'd her damask robe 
 
 Close round her queenly form, 
 And led her nervous friend along, 
 
 Who trembled at the storm. 
 
 But the beautiful lady welcom'd them 
 
 With such a radiant eye, 
 That they fancied Summer had come again, 
 
 And Winter was quite gone by. 
 
 They took their India-rubbers off, 
 
 And laid their hoods away, 
 And whisper'd in each other's ear, 
 
 " We should like to spend the day." 
 
 She charm'd them with her tuneful voice, 
 
 Till both were unable to stir ; 
 So there they staid, — and the flowers of love 
 
 Have found their home with her. 
 
MUSINGS JOY. 
 
 BY H. GREELEY. 
 
 " Spirit of Joy ! thy altar lies 
 
 In youthful hearts that hope, like mine." 
 
 Moore. 
 I. 
 
 They wrong thee, Thought ! the vain, the gay, 
 
 Who deem thy spell with sorrow blent ; 
 Who miss from out thy being's ray 
 
 The placid smile of blithe content — 
 Who mark thy shadow on the brow, 
 
 Thy sometime wildness in the eye, 
 And deem the soul must inly bow 
 
 To Care's dull weight— to Misery's sigh. 
 
 II. 
 
 No ! — oft across my teeming brain 
 
 Thy airy shapes, innumerous glide ; 
 And phantasies,— a wayward train, — 
 
 With sober Truth that realm divide : 
 But all unmix'd with Gloom or Wo, 
 
 Thy gentle influence o'er me steals : 
 Ah ! half allied to Rapture's glow 
 
 The spell thy ardent votary feels. 
 
THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 III. 
 
 Aye ! even in many a waking hour, 
 
 Come dreams to madness near allied — 
 The hope to scale the heights of power — 
 
 A Nation's choice, a Senate's pride : 
 Full well I know such thoughts but mock 
 
 The mind to which no more is given : 
 But humblest blade and loftiest oak 
 
 Alike may rear their heads to heaven. 
 
 IV. 
 
 My dreams may fade, as dreams have faded, 
 
 My heart congeal from Misery's chill : 
 My path with Care and Wo be shaded ; 
 
 Well— Hope enjoyed is Rapture still ! 
 If 111 shall overcloud my morrow, 
 
 Still Hope shall breathe, It cannot last ; 
 And on the sombre clouds of Sorrow 
 
 Reflect the sunshine of the Past. 
 
 Mew- York, 1839. 
 
THE EARLY DEAD. 
 
 THE EARLY DEAD. 
 
 BY WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK. 
 
 When into dust, like dewy flowers departed, 
 
 From our dim paths the bright and lovely fade ; 
 The fair in form— the pure— the gentle-hearted, 
 
 Whose looks within the breast a Sabbath made- 
 How, like a whisper on the inconstant wind, 
 The memory of their voices stirs the mind ! 
 
 We hear the song, the sigh, the fitful laughter, 
 That from their lips in balm were wont to flow, 
 
 When Hope's beguiling wing they hurried after, 
 And drank her syren music, long ago : 
 
 When Joy's bright harp to sweetest lays was strung, 
 
 And poured ri'jh numbers for the loved and young. 
 
 When the pale stars are burning high in heaven — 
 When the low night-winds kiss the flowering tree, 
 
 And thoughts are deepening in the hush of even, 
 How soft those voices on the heart will be ! 
 
 They breathe of raptures that have bloomed and 
 
 Of sorrows by remembrance sanctified. [died — 
 
 Yet when the loved have from our pathway vanish- 
 What potent magic can their smiles restore 1 [ed, 
 
 Like some gay sunburst, by the tempest banished, 
 They passed in darkness— they will come no more ; 
 
b THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Unlike the daybeams, when the storm hath fled, 
 No light renewed breaks on their lowly bed. 
 
 And yet what mourner, though the thoughtful eye 
 Be dim and tremulous with burning tears, 
 
 But should with rapture gaze upon the sky, 
 Through whose far depths the spirit's whig ca- 
 reers? 
 
 There light immortal o'er their home is flung, 
 
 Who fade from earth while yet their years are young 
 
 Philadelphia. 
 
OLD LETTERS. 
 
 OLD LETTERS. 
 
 BY J. DIXON. 
 
 Old Letters! What are they but wings, not the 
 less Daedalian for the wax with which haply they 
 are sealed, on which we may be wafted back, in 
 spirit, over the Gulf of Years, to the shores of the 
 happy past 7 Are we not young again, re-reading 
 these forgotten histories 1 Seem they not like those 
 dim remembrances of another world, which some- 
 times haunt us, teaching that 
 
 " The soul that rises with us — our life's star, 
 
 Hath had elsewhere its setting, 
 And cometh from afar ? " 
 
 Docs not the shadow on the dial go back — does not 
 life stand still, as we linger over these still-speaking 
 heralds of the past 1 Do I dream, or is it thy face, 
 N.T. R. — dimly pictured — growing slowly more dis- 
 tinct — that I see on that neatly-written sheet — the 
 elegant chirography, fit emblem of thyself? Me- 
 thinks thy smile was gayer. 
 
 Alas ! that our youth is not eternal ! — But my 
 theme is not sad ; pardon me, sweet lady — it is my 
 mood. 
 
 There is but one thing for which I cannot forgive 
 
 Ellen . That she should request me to return 
 
 her letters— was too much. I have them all in my 
 
8 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 memory, but The handwriting— the sheet on 
 
 which the delicate fingers have rested — and on one, 
 ye gods, 'tis true ! — the deep stain of one full, heavy 
 tear ! Can any thing repay the loss of these 1 
 
 Gentle reader ! — I feel that I speak to your heart. 
 Is there not, locked carefully in some precious 
 casket, a letter — perhaps more than one — every word 
 of which is engraven on your memory, yet which you 
 read, it may be daily, striving to find some new and 
 hidden meaning in its familiar sentences ? It speaks 
 perchance of love, and proves — that your lover is 
 careless. Eschew love-letters, let me say. 
 
 I fancy I can determine a man's character from 
 his letters. If his sentiments are disguised, some- 
 thing, if it be but the handwriting, will betray him. 
 I wish for no better physiognomy. Who would not 
 see thee, A. S. C— with thy epiiet smile, and deep 
 thoughts, flowing like a full river, calm, still, but 
 mighty, uttered with an unpretending voice — in thy 
 elegant and pithy letters? And thou, too, sweet 
 Florence, — whom alone, of earthly maidens, I re- 
 member in my solitude — hast thou not depicted 
 thine own elegant mind in those sky-blue, gilt-edged 
 folios 1 I have not forgotten thee ; and it may be, 
 on some shady, bird-haunted island — afar down the 
 River of Time — we may meet again. And thou, 
 
 Ellen , whom I have said I can never forgive, 
 
 for recalling those carrier pigeons of thy heart, thine 
 own sweet letters — was not their fitful and passion 
 ate eloquence a type of thyself— a spiritual portrait, 
 more perfect than any work of human art — an im- 
 age of thy soul 1 
 
 How strangely it strikes one to fall in, accident- 
 
OLD LETTERS. 9 
 
 ally, with tin old letter of one's own writing ! It is 
 like meeting a half-forgotten friend. We should 
 know those thoughts ; but when, or where we made 
 their acquaintance, we cannot, for our life, remem- 
 ber. Yet we would believe they can scarcely be 
 our own. The wit, we would fain think, was keen- 
 er — its spirit must have evaporated as the ink has 
 paled— and the sentiments were less trite. In how 
 short a time have those startling paradoxes grown 
 truisms ! Even the handwriting, which we had 
 once fondly deemed almost beautiful — how sadly 
 old age has cramped it ! And the style, too— but we 
 write better now. 
 
 We may not live alway. Our life is but a dream 
 of misery, from which, too often I fear, we awake 
 to the reality. There is but one solace for human 
 suffering, and that is human love. It is the soul's 
 aliment. Therefore do I love a letter, old or new — 
 for the new will soon be old. They are the messen- 
 gers of" love and friendship — the winged Mercuries 
 of the heart ; and in their old age shall they be for- 
 gotten ? They have served their day — they have 
 finished their course ; tears from sorrowing eyes 
 have fallen upon them, glad hearts have leaped with 
 joy over them, and now shall they be neglected and 
 despised ? I would not use a brute thus. Yet there 
 be many who have no ears for the mute voice of an 
 old letter ; they forget how it thrilled them once ; 
 they remember not the trembling hands with which 
 the seal was broken, and the joy or the sorrow 
 which it inspired is forgotten. 
 
 I have a fondness for antiquity in general : and 
 w hat grows old sooner than a letter ? Age is merely 
 
10 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 relative, and this letter under my hand, that has 
 come all the way from Georgia, since November, is 
 older than the Madeira that sparkles beside it. It is 
 a great merit to grow old rapidly, and while the 
 wine has been mellowing — not over two voyages — 
 how many an old letter has grown a perfect ruin ! 
 
 A ruin! Who would not wish to gaze, before 
 death closes Ins eyes for ever, on a magnificent, 
 time-worn ruin of the old world 1 Mouldering col- 
 umns, threatening arches, overhanging walls, dim 
 aisles, and dark, deep dungeons — all that remains of 
 frowning castles, within whose shelter, in the glori- 
 ous days of chivalry, the dwellers in the wild coun- 
 try around sought refuge ; what heart would not 
 throb, gazing on these awful relics ? Mighty men 
 and beautiful women have caused the glad music of 
 life to resound through those broad passages, and 
 now — where are they? Silence — death's music — 
 is over and around them. Let them sleep ! 
 
 But — smile not, I am serious — an old letter is a 
 nobler, gloomier ruin than the proudest edifice that 
 ever crumbled to the earth. What hopes and fears, 
 and joys and griefs, were once centred in its tear- 
 dimmed pages ! Could you but read the history of 
 that letter, it would teach you that the humblest in- 
 terests of the human heart are as important as the 
 weal or wo of monarchs. Perchance it was written 
 in grief—perchance in joy. It told, perhaps, of tho 
 death of a friend, a brother, a parent. It may be 
 that long cherished hopes were blighted by its heart- 
 crushing intelligence. Perfidy, ingratitude, treach- 
 ery, may have been there exhibited. Perchance in 
 solitude and sadness that sheet was read, and over 
 
OLD LETTERS. 11 
 
 it the heart was broken, and then commenced the 
 first moment of a life of despair ! It speaks, per- 
 haps, of affections estranged, of love grown cold. 
 Or, perhaps, to some sweet maiden, blooming like 
 the wild flower of her own native valleys, it brought 
 the first assurance of his love, whom in silence and 
 solitude her heart had wedded long before, unknown 
 even to itself. 
 
 Of all letters, a love-letter alone is not improved 
 by age. Witness the profane glee of a maiden of 
 sixteen, over the torn and blurred sheets newly dis- 
 covered in the garret, setting forth the love of her 
 honored father for the sweet Isabella Bellville, now 
 no less a person than her own careful mother. It 
 is, — it is the self-same dignified handwriting. How 
 ill befitting it seems to those soft sentiments ! Alas ! 
 twenty years have unetherealised his angel. The 
 seraph has become a mortal — no longer, 
 
 too bright and good, 
 For human nature's daily food. 
 
 The goddess has become a housewife. She excels 
 in recipes ; she looks to the main chance ; she saves 
 the fragments ! 
 
 Ye who affect the tender passion — if ye must write 
 down your love, burn, I beseech you, on your wed- 
 ding night, your letters — if their heat have not alrea- 
 dy consumed them. Those vows and protestations 
 will embitter many a sweet quarrel— their perusal, 
 believe me, will be any thing but refreshing, after a 
 reconciliation. 
 
 My amusement, of a melancholy hour, is looking 
 
12 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 over my old letters, male and female. I forget my 
 friendless, bachelor estate, as I linger over the crow- 
 quill traces of many a delicate female's autograph. 
 If a poor pun could console me, I might remember 
 that they gave ine their hands. Hearts, I fear me, 
 much, they had none. 
 
THE LTFE OF DREAMS. 13 
 
 THE LIFE OF DREAMS. 
 
 BY WILLIAM FALCONER. 
 1. 
 
 How sweet to live over again in a dream 
 
 Lost hours which for ever have fled ; [stream, 
 To sit 'mong the flowers, by the Past's pictured 
 
 And discourse with the beautiful dead ! 
 2. 
 To roam through the woods where our Infancy trod, 
 
 As gay as the spring-birds above ; 
 O then the free spirit is nearer its God, 
 
 For it floats on the pinions of Love. 
 
 3. 
 Come, repose thee, my friend, in this musical wood, 
 
 And I'll tell thee my dream of last night ! 
 Mcthought by the grave of the loved one I stood, 
 
 As faded the West's purple light : 
 
 4. 
 And that like Aurora she rose from the grave, 
 
 As fresh to the eye as when last 
 Together we sat by the wild-wooded wave, 
 
 In the far summer days of the Past ! 
 
 Methought where the beam of her azure eye fell, 
 All grew bright as when feeling was young ; 
 
 For the landscape of Childhood remembered so well, 
 Around us by magic was flung. 
 
14 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 And together we roamed to the old ruined tower, 
 
 Where the wild flowers like fairy gifts bloom : 
 And my spirit forgot in that mystical bower 
 
 My love had e'er slept in the tomb. 
 7. 
 And we loved, as we loved in the years long ago, 
 
 And my heart beat with rapture as then ; 
 For its pulses were free from the bondage of woe, 
 
 And was e'en in its spring-time again. 
 
 8. 
 O, to live for an hour in that vision once more, 
 
 I would barter all earth can impart : 
 But Fancy's kaleidoscope ne'er can restore 
 
 That dream to my sorrowing heart. 
 
 9. 
 As the bark when becalmed in the blue southern 
 
 Descries some fair island of peace, [main 
 
 But, severed by storms, never finds it again — 
 
 So parted my vision of bliss ! 
 10. 
 No juice of the poppy, nor fabulous spell, 
 
 Nor the sage's most coveted lore, 
 Can rebuild that fair fabric of slumber that fell 
 
 Into ruin, like joys that are o'er ! 
 
 Paris, Feb. 17, 1838. 
 
THE DYING WARRIOR. 
 
 THE DYING WARRIOR. 
 
 BY G. M. SNOW. 
 
 " Oh ! place me on my old war horse, 
 
 And place my spear in rest ; 
 And gird the spur upon my heel, 
 
 The corslet on my breast : 
 I would don my harness once again, 
 
 I would ride one more career — 
 For I love the wail of the stirring trump, 
 
 The glaive, and the oaken spear. 
 
 " I would I could see on the breezes free 
 
 My banner once more flung out ! 
 I would that these failing cars might hear 
 
 Once more my battle shout ! 
 Oh ! place me on Selim's back again, 
 
 I would die in my warrior's mail— 
 The spirit of old will bear me up, 
 
 Though the wasted flesh may fail ! 
 
 " So ! I am young ! Death to the Moor ! 
 
 I ride with as free a rein 
 As when I trampled the Payniin down, 
 
 On the bloody fields of Spain ! 
 Advance my banner ! my heart leaps high 
 
 At the sight of its folds again ! 
 Ho ! Charge, as ye charged in days of yore, 
 
 And God, in his might, for Spain ! 
 
16 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 The spear has dropped from his powerless gr; 
 
 He has broken a lance with Death : 
 He will mount no more for the battle field, 
 
 At the trumpet's warning breath: 
 He sleeps with the great of his noble line — 
 
 But Decay's corrupting touch 
 Cannot dim one word of his epitaph — 
 
 " Sans peur et sans reproche '." 
 
BLEEPING-PI.ACE. J7 
 
 KolftqTiipi'ov. 
 
 jphia Greek word, from wiich our' Cemetery' in derived, signifies 
 
 'Sleeping-place.' 
 
 BY KEV. J. WILLIAMS. 
 
 Not home of death we call thee, Churchyard, then, 
 Man's resting place ; 
 Sweet couch for misery, 
 To poor and humble free, 
 
 — Who have God's grace, 
 And willing yield their souls to him again: — 
 Where all sleep sweetly, side by side, 
 Nor harm can come, nor ill betide. 
 
 Blast bed of rest ! beneath the summer flowers 
 We quiet sleep ; 
 While mid the shadowy trees, 
 That moan with passing breeze, 
 And o'er us weep, 
 Sweet birds do warble to the passing shower ; 
 Or 'chance at eve, our spirits come, 
 And hover o'er their ancient home. 
 
 Why should they not ? The day will come 'tis known 
 When we must rise, 
 And in our bodily form, 
 With life and being warm, 
 See with our eyes, 
 
18 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 The vision of our Judge on cloud built throne. 
 Why then may not the soul keep ward, 
 O'er temples of the living Lord ? 
 
 Sweet couch ! untroubled rest ! oh thou dost seem 
 A blessing high, 
 The great God doth ordain ; 
 And though it be short pain, 
 To close the eye, 
 In that deep sleep that knows no fearful dream, 
 Yet if we sleep in Christ, we know 
 We wake to bliss, and sleep to woe. 
 
POWER AND MERCY. 19 
 
 POWER AND MERCY. 
 
 BY WILLIAM JAMES HAMERSLEY. 
 
 It comes ! th' oppressive air is motionless, 
 And Nature seems like one, who, passion-wrought, 
 Will, fixed and breathless, for one moment stand, 
 Before he gives the madd'ning impulse way. 
 The sky is all concealed by murky clouds, 
 Whose deep-toned murmurs give a sense of awe, 
 And with a sad foreboding weigh us down ; 
 The waves in mighty undulation swell, 
 Making fantastic foam-wreaths in the air, 
 And, in their mad rebellion rushing on, 
 Aspire to their funereal canopy, 
 Uprising with their wild and whitened locks, 
 Like old prophetic seers denouncing woe .' 
 Now reels the maelstrom like a maniac's brain, 
 And now the lightning fires the autumn woods, 
 And like invading hosts, the lurid flames 
 Pass by in wrath, and leave no sign behind 
 Save desolation. The avalanche rolls down, 
 Gath'ring new strength at each successive bound, 
 At once a shroud, a monument, a grave ! 
 
 The red volcano belches out its fires, 
 And sends its lava-fury through the towns, 
 Pelting great cities with its burning stones, 
 As if the works of men were playthings all. 
 
20 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Thunders above ! beneath ! within the ground, 
 The mighty earthquake swells its fearful wrath, 
 And soon from its imprisonment bursts forth, 
 As on the Judgment-day the dead will come : 
 Commanding cities, lordly palaces, 
 High tow'rs, proud fanes, and boastful works of art, 
 Are crushed within the hollow of its hand. 
 Like the dark fiend of hell, foul pestilence, 
 Stalking in horrid stillness is abroad, 
 And gathers up his helpless prey in flocks, 
 And gives them to his pulseless master, Death ! 
 The sand-wrought columns o'er the desert stalk 
 In fearfulncss, like giant misanthropes, 
 And glide as victors o'er their fallen foes. 
 The whirlwinds' awful sound ! God's clarion ! 
 The forcst-monarchs bend their lofty heads, 
 And bending not enough, like fragile reeda 
 Are broken. 
 
 Oh ! how full of strength is God ! 
 Ocean and earth reveal his might and povv'r, 
 And the loud, and chainless winds, proclaim it. 
 Oh ! will he not in wrath destroy the world, 
 And set his mighty engines all at work, 
 To sweep poor man from his creation off? 
 
 Away vain fear ! the writing of his hand 
 Is now appearing in the firmament : 
 Ye who saw his might, behold his mercy ! 
 Behold God's covenant upon the clouds! 
 
ESSAY ON DREAMS. 21 
 
 'OvsipoTroXict. 
 
 AN ESSAY ON DREAMS. 
 BY DAVID LAMBERT. 
 
 " We are such stuff as dreams are made of," says 
 the immortal Bard of Avon. This is one of those 
 fine, impressive sayings that pass into proverbs. 
 We reiterate them— we acknowledge their justice — 
 hut we rarely analyze or examine them. Of the 
 thousands and tens of thousands who may reasona- 
 bly he supposed to have repeated the line we have 
 quoted, how few have ever felt their true force, or 
 inquired of themselves, " What is this ' stuff that 
 dreams are made of 1 ' " What are dreams, or what 
 affinity do they bear to our waking visions 1 
 
 Philosophically considered, dreams are but the 
 continuation of our waking reveries. In sleep the 
 fancy, unrestricted by the stern vigilance of reason, 
 untrammelled by the presence of surrounding ob- 
 jects, runs riot— sometimes gracefully wandering in 
 the flowery paths of pleasure, calling the smile of 
 delight to the unconscious lips of beauty, or to the 
 sterner features of manhood. At others, wildly 
 rushing into the midst of scenes of pain, of anguish, 
 and of hopeless misery. At one time the dreamer 
 basks in the sunshine of prosperity, and roves in the 
 gardens of Love. "The wealth of Ormus and of 
 Ind" is poured out before him — The houris of Ma- 
 homet's paradise bewitch him with the gentle lustre 
 
22 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 of their eyes— Scenes of enchantment swell on his 
 astonished gaze — Banquets fit for the gods await 
 his taste— The music of Heaven is warbled in his 
 ears. Anon, the scene shifts— He is alone, among 
 rocks, and deserts and wild beasts — he starts, he 
 trembles, he fears some nameless, horrible, disaster ; 
 he tries to fly, but his limbs refuse to carry him : 
 he is chained to the spot— a feeling of utter hope- 
 lessness overcomes him ; he is doomed. The cold 
 sweat gathers on his brow, — physical excitement 
 conquers sleep, and with a gasp of agony he starts 
 awake ! 
 
 The same states of mental action which produce 
 these different results, would, in waking moments, 
 cause feelings of unwonted exhilaration or of cor- 
 responding depression : what are termed in common 
 parlance, good or bad spirits, — moments of inspira- 
 tion, or of utter despondency. 
 
 The good old days when " old men saw visions, 
 and young men dreamed dreams," are now gone by. 
 The fantastical wanderings of the sleeper's imagina- 
 tion are no longer invested with that deep import- 
 ance with which they were formerly clad. The 
 march of intellect and the advance of science has 
 stripped from their illusions the pranks of the fairy 
 queen Mab. The portals of Ivory and of Horn are 
 no longer opened for the egress of nocturnal spirits. 
 The night Hag now only appears in the wake of a 
 champagne supper or a turtle feast. The romance 
 of dreams is mostly fled. Still in the quiet villages 
 of sober New England, and even in sometime-hon- 
 ored nooks of our large cities, a few venerable spin- 
 sters may be found, whose religious belief in the 
 
 
ESSAY ON DREAMS. 23 
 
 mysterious character of dreams is unshaken and 
 unimpaired by the profane scoffings of the rising 
 generation. They have dreamed dreams that were 
 the sure precursors of the events they so faithfully 
 foretold. Never has a death happened in the circle 
 of their acquaintance, but three times thrice it has 
 been revealed to them in sleep — nor a marriage of 
 which they have not had similar mysterious pre- 
 admonitions. The Seven Sleepers of the Eastern 
 tale, who certainly enjoyed the longest nap on re- 
 cord, could not have had a more miscellaneous se- 
 ries of nocturnal visions. 
 
 Alas ! we put no faith in dreams. Would that we 
 could ; some days would surely await us were they 
 to be fulfilled, that would richly compensate many 
 a weary year of toil. Who is there that has not in 
 dreams found himself by the side of some lovely 
 girl, wandering in the wild green wood ! Deep si- 
 lence reigning around, only broken by the occasion- 
 al note of some forest warbler— there has he loiter- 
 ed — it would seem for hours of deep and ever vary- 
 ing delight—then the warm words of passion, of 
 deep unquenchable love, that he would pour from 
 the inmost recesses of his heart, and the crystal tear 
 in that downcast eye, the heightened blush of that 
 lovely cheek, the heaving of that swelling bosom, 
 as the lips of the sweetest creation of a poet's fancy 
 breathed forth in soft and broken accents those 
 words which made his happiness unspeakable! 
 Oh, the pity of ever waking from such a dream ! 
 
 Our good old bachelor friend Horatius is some- 
 thing of a visionary ; and it was one of these dreams 
 that lately tempted him to revisit, after an absence 
 
24 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 of many years, the scene of his boyish days. " The 
 companions of my youthful sports," said he to us, 
 as we talked the matter over after his return, " the 
 first dream of early love, and the form of the sweet 
 village girl who had made the first impressions on a 
 school boy's heart — all of whom I grieve to confess 
 had been nearly obliterated from my memory by 
 the active business of an absorbing profession, — ap- 
 peared before me in a dream, with all the freshness 
 of reality. It seemed that ' Love's young dream' 
 again revived, more subtily than ever, beguiled 
 my senses, and my own sweet Mary was lovelier 
 than the ' Peris of Paradise.' " Alas for our good 
 old-bachelor friend ! The ardor of his imagination 
 overleaped the lapse of years, and the occupations 
 of a busy life had kept him in ignorance of the news 
 of his almost forgotten village. Time may well be 
 called " edax rerum," the devourer of all things. 
 Some of our friend's early companions had been sum- 
 moned by the inexorable tyrant to their long account. 
 Over others, a wave of his magic glass and a touch of 
 the fatal sickle, had spread the transforming garb of 
 age. Above all, Mary, his Mary — the "inexpres- 
 sive" vision of his sleeping and waking dreams for 
 the last weary month — weary till he could once 
 more find himself in her bewitching presence, — Ms 
 Marij was introduced to her half incredulous, and 
 wholly disappointed lover,as Mrs. Nehemiah Stubbs ! 
 Nor was the occupation of his fair one more roman- 
 tic than the name for which she had exchanged the 
 more euphoneous title of Mary Warner. He found 
 her — not as Werter first met his Charlotte, cutting 
 with ineffable grace bread and butter for her little 
 
ESSAY ON DREAMS. 25 
 
 brothers and sisters — but, surrounded by a group of 
 little flaxen headed urchins, seriously superintend- 
 ing the manufacture of an immense cheese ! Hero 
 was a Bathos — a countercheck — a repulsion. Mar- 
 ried, and to a Stuhbs ! So altered, too. Where was 
 that delicacy of form, and soft bright eye which had 
 won his boyish heart t And such a horrible occu- 
 pation — making a cheese! In two hours Horatiua 
 was on his way to the city, where, buried in the 
 penetralia of his Law office, he made haste to for- 
 get his disappointment, and never more put faith in 
 dreams. ******** 
 
 One of the most remarkable circumstances at- 
 tending dreams, is the sort of double existence with 
 which our sleeping visions are often gifted. Thus 
 we sometimes will seem to stand one side and watch 
 the working of a passion, or the development of an 
 adventure of which we ourselves are the subjects. 
 We seem to lose our individuality, or to possess a 
 two-fold being. Our sensations are something as 
 we may suppose, had they the power of reason and 
 reflection, would be felt by those marine animals or 
 zoophytes in whom the separation of the body pro- 
 duces not death, but each part continues to exist a 
 distinct and separate being. There is something 
 strange in a dream of this nature. It seems to lift 
 the curtain, and give a faint glimpse of a future 
 and incomprehensible state of being. 
 
 Who would undertake to classify dreams 1 Their 
 species are more numerous than the sands of the 
 sea-shore. Sometimes they are as simple as the 
 plainest thought of our waking moments— at others 
 complex,— involved,— eccentric. Oft times we will 
 
26 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 dream that we are dreaming, and try in our sleep to 
 waken from our trance, at others a dream will 
 6eem to re-commence at some pqint where it had 
 left off before — and appear like the narration of a 
 tale to be clearly and consistently-continued. 
 
 We have somewhere read of a German student 
 who, by long care and much training, possessed the 
 mastery over his dreams ; so that before committing 
 himself to sleep he could regulate at will the enter- 
 tainments of his nocturnal hours. He was poor in 
 purse and feeble in health; but in his dreams he 
 was richer than the famous king of Lydia — robust 
 as the mature Hercules. All the splendors of wealth 
 and power were gathered around him, and stretched 
 on his humble pallet, he ruled the destinies of imagi- 
 nary nations. What was the real existence of this 
 man ? In sleep, continuously and regularly, night af- 
 ter night, a powerful emperor — waking, a humble 
 peasant. Who shall say he was not as much the for- 
 mer, as the latter ? What are our waking moments, 
 but strange, wild dreams ? Who that receives some 
 sudden accession of fortune, does not secretly pinch 
 his arm or bite his lip, to prove that he is not dream- 
 ing; thereby showing the narrow distinction be- 
 tween the day-dream, and the vision of the night ! 
 
 "We are such stuff 
 As dreams are made of; and our little life 
 Is rounded with a sleep." 
 
 JVcmj- York, Oct. 1838. 
 
SUMMER EVENING. 27 
 
 SUMMER EVENING. 
 
 BY THE REV. R. TURNBUXL. 
 
 The (lay declines— the garish light is gone, 
 And over hill and dale the twilight falls ; 
 
 The star of eve begins to smile alone 
 In her far western bower ; the night-bird calls 
 
 Unto her mate, in wild, melodious tone ; 
 Whilst on the listening ear the murmur falls 
 
 Of a small brook, which gladly rolls along, 
 
 And softly mingles with the milk-maid's song. 
 
 I seek the river's brink, whose placid breast 
 Mirrors the brightness of that lovely star, 
 
 Which, from its high and hallowed place of rest, 
 Looks down on sinful men, who, from afar, 
 
 Regard it as some region of the blest, 
 Who, having passed the dark, untrodden bar 
 
 That bounds the tide of time, have reached the 
 shore, 
 
 " Where tempests never beat, nor billows roar." 
 
 The fresh and balmy winds which crisp the wave, 
 And send a ripple to the pebbly shore, 
 
 My flushed and burning temples sweetly lave, 
 And to the troubled mind its peace restore, 
 
 Which erewhile wandered by the gloomy grave 
 Of its lost hopes, or heard the dismal roar 
 
 Of life departing to the tideless sea 
 
 Of a dim, dark, untried eternity. 
 
28 THE MOSS-HOSE. 
 
 The hush of eve — the murmur of the stream — 
 The mirrored beauty of its placid breast — 
 
 The memory of the past — my childhood's dream, 
 The breezes wandering to their place of rest, 
 
 The lonely star of eve, which I might deem 
 The pure and cherished home of spirits blest, 
 
 Come o'er me with a soft and hallowed spell, 
 
 And all the gloom of thought and care dispel. 
 
 Alone, with nature, and with God I stand ! 
 
 And the soolhed spirit folds her wings in peace ; 
 Whilst o'er it comes the shade of that far land, 
 
 Where care-worn mortals find a sweet release 
 From all the ills of life, at God's right hand ; 
 
 W T here care and sorrow shall forever cease, 
 And o'er the mounting spirit beam the ray 
 Of unobstructed, everlasting day ! 
 
WHEN IN FOND MEMORY'S MAGIC GLASS 29 
 
 WHEN IN FOND MEMORY'S MAGIC GLASS. 
 
 When in fond Memory's magic glass, 
 
 With earnest eye intent we gaze, 
 And there in quick succession pass 
 
 The buried joys of former days : 
 We read Life's folded leaves again, 
 
 Scenes that of erst we loved so well — 
 When young Love wove his flowery chain, 
 
 And Hope her magic spell ! 
 
 And Childhood's happy home is there, 
 
 And Childhood's free and blithesome hours : 
 Again we prove a mother's care, 
 
 'Neath young Life's radiant morning bowers ; 
 A reverend father bows him then, 
 
 Fervent his gladsome child to bless ; 
 Brothers and sisters join again 
 
 In Love's endeared caress. 
 
 Then, when Time rolls his years along, 
 We rove the flowery paths of youth, 
 
 We list to Hope's delusive song, 
 And deem her golden promise truth : 
 
 Bright beam the skies above our head- 
 Fair are the vales beneath our feet — 
 
 Onward we rush with eager tread, 
 To scenes with joy replete ! 
 
30 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 The dead — the dead — the peaceful dead, 
 
 Come crowding from the spirit laud ! 
 Again we list the well known tread — 
 
 Again we grasp the friendly hand ; 
 We gaze on each familiar face, 
 
 Loved in our early hour of pride ; 
 And joyous in the fond embrace, 
 
 We deem they have not died ! 
 
 Thus, when in Memory's magic glass, 
 
 With lingering glance we fondly gaze, 
 And there in quick succession pass 
 
 The loved, the lost, of other days ; 
 Again we live those seasons fair, 
 
 And love those scenes we loved so well ; 
 And weep when Earth's returning care 
 
 Has broke the spirit-spell ! 
 
 C. W. E. 
 
NOVEMBER. 31 
 
 NOVEMBER 
 
 1. 
 
 These raving winds that chide the silent glade, 
 And frowning clouds that ride the air above, 
 And plains where frost has bleached the tender 
 blade, 
 Of all which nature wears, the most I love. 
 ' 2. 
 
 Thus was it not in boyhood's better hour, 
 
 When wildly bounding with the free bird's wing, 
 My bosom blessed the first low dawning flower, 
 And carolled to the breeze of coming spring. 
 3. 
 But hearts like seasons change. The bud that 
 breathes 
 Upon the glebe, bleak winter will destroy ; 
 And ice must clasp the bough that summer wreathes ; 
 So fate can wither up the young soul's joy. 
 
 4. 
 Yon twilight hue which fleets away so pale, 
 
 The nightly shadows hast'ning chill and fast, 
 The faded herb along the tuneless vale, 
 
 The sapless reed that shivers in the blast — 
 6. 
 The lonely elm, which, bending o'er the stream, 
 
 Resigns its last gray leaf amid the tide, 
 Where once it saw, beneath a kindlier beam, 
 
 Its summer tresses mirrored fair and wide — 
 
33 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 6. 
 The bird that lingers mute upon the spray, 
 
 Her nest deserted, yet again to view, 
 Before she wings afar her exile way, 
 Of me and mine, is each an emblem true. 
 7. 
 And thou! — Yet why an image ever bring 
 
 To haunt the grave of buried hopes mildest, 
 And siir the last, black, bitter dregs that cling 
 Like poisoned fangs within this callous breast ? 
 8. 
 That dream an orphan's craving long had fed, 
 
 And wanned with rosy beams his dreary state; 
 But ah! too late the sweet delirium fled, 
 He woke, and all was void and desolate. 
 9. 
 Can spring with all her light and laughing bloom, 
 
 Her gushing music and her breezes bland, 
 One ray of gladness shed upon his doom, 
 Till welcome death the homeless wretch demand ? 
 10. 
 Better the sallow leaf, the vineyard shorn, 
 
 The scathed limb that angry gusts have riven, 
 The hollow stalk bereft of golden corn, 
 And blooinless wastes and dearth, to him be given. 
 11. 
 Nature, an hour for all thou'st made aright! 
 
 A season fair to shine on happy hearts; 
 A darker hour to meet the spirit's blight, 
 When all but breath and bitterness, departs. 
 Ex R. 
 
THE ARAB STEED. 33 
 
 THE ARAB STEED. 
 
 BY WILLIAM FALCONER. 
 
 The wounded sheik lay bound in chains, 
 
 But his Arab heart beat high, 
 As he thought upon his tented plains, 
 
 Where pastoral palm-trees sigh : 
 He pondered on the wealth of Life 
 
 Squandered like worthless store — 
 Of his brave companions in the strife, 
 
 Now blackcning-in their gore ! 
 
 His spirit sunk into a dream — 
 
 The vultures fierce he saw 
 By a red carnage-cumbered stream 
 
 Their pulseless bosoms gnaw : 
 He viewed his stately patriarch tent, 
 
 With his fair boys at play : 
 He heard their careless merriment, 
 
 And Abla's love-taught lay. 
 
 Fond one ! she knew not that the morn 
 
 Would shine the last for him, 
 Else would she rend her locks forlorn, 
 
 Else were her dark eye dim : 
 That Chief had looked in Death's dark face, 
 
 From Youth, without a fear ; 
 Yet in his eye you then might trace 
 
 The semblance of a tear. 
 3 ^ 
 
34 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 But deem not 'twas bis own dark doom 
 
 Bade that warm tribute start : 
 It was— that on his slighted tomb 
 
 Would break that loving heart ! 
 What rouses his lost thoughts at length ? 
 
 A desert steed's wild neigli : 
 Free, as when glorying in his strength 
 
 He joins the battle fray. 
 
 " My steed ! I knew thy neigh full well, 
 
 Thou rival of the gale ! 
 Long shall the desert minstrel tell 
 
 Thine and thy master's tale : 
 And shall thou never more career 
 
 Athwart the desert wide, 
 My noble barb, but linger here, 
 
 Neglected in thy pride 1 
 
 "Yes !" as he spoke, his lord forgot 
 
 His hastening doom, and crept, 
 Though bleeding, fired by generous thought, 
 
 Midst free that heedless slept, 
 Until he found his noble steed, 
 
 Then gnawed his cord apart, 
 With fastly failing strength, and freed 
 
 The sharer of his heart. 
 
 «' Now speed thee hence, my noble one, 
 
 And seek my regal tent, 
 And tell that ere to-morrow's sun 
 
 Shall Kaled's breath be spent ! 
 
THE ARAB STEED. 35 
 
 Say to my black-eyed Abla, too, 
 
 In vain shall she deplore, 
 And the blue distant mountains view, 
 
 For Kaled comes no more ! 
 
 " Away !"— the earth the bold barb spurned, 
 
 And scorned the sandy plain : 
 But swiftly to his lord returned, 
 
 As though he felt the rein, 
 And gazed — and neighed — then in his teeth 
 
 He seized the dying sheik 
 And bore him safe from savage death, 
 
 Ere morning's bloody streak. 
 
 Away ! o'er mount and desert waste, 
 
 Away ! through torrent's foam, 
 The steed and fainted rider haste 
 
 Unto their patriarch home ! 
 The goal is reached— the race is o'er, 
 
 Ere waned that fated night : 
 The Chief is saved— but ah ! no more 
 
 His steed shall view the light. 
 
 Beneath the tent's broad sycamore, 
 
 Upon the lilied turf, 
 He gasps for life, besmeared with gore, 
 
 And foam, like Ocean's surf: 
 Yet still upon his lord he keeps 
 
 His dimmed black eye with pride, 
 Who, weary, worn, unconscious i 
 
 With Abla by his side ! 
 
36 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Bold barb ! the desert harp shall swell 
 
 Its proudest song for thee ; 
 And pilgrims by the shady well 
 
 Vaunt thy fidelity. 
 When heroes fell, each high strung lyre 
 
 Awoke a kindred lay : 
 Nor didst thou without song expire, 
 
 For thou wert bold as they. 
 
 Paris, Nov. 18, 1837. 
 
 [Tbc subject of this anecdote in rhyme is taken 
 from Lainartine's " Travels in the East," vol. iii.] 
 
37 
 
 Lero. ' 
 Horace. 
 
 STANZAS. 
 
 " Carpe diem, quam minimum creiUila post 
 
 BY CHAUNCEY L. DAVIS. 
 
 " Carpe diem ;" catch the fleeting 
 
 Pleasures of the present day, 
 While the pulse of health is heating, 
 
 And the strength knows no decay. 
 
 " Carpe diem ;" for the morrow, 
 Dark within the Future's womb, 
 
 May bring with it care and sorrow, 
 Or shine upon thy new made tomb. 
 
 Odors rich the halls are lading, 
 
 And thy brows are crowned with flowers ; 
 Those shall perish, these are fading, 
 
 Catch then quick the fleeting hours. 
 
 Such thy lesson, jovial Flaccus, 
 
 Such thy practice, gentle bard ; 
 The smiles of Venus and of Bacchus 
 
 Were for thee a rich reward. 
 
 Yet, Horace, well enough thou knewest 
 Thy precept and thy practice vain ; 
 
 That fleeting joys are never truest, 
 That pleasure needs the rest of pain. 
 
38 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Though the wine-cup sparkles brightly, 
 Though with joy each face is flushed, 
 
 Though song and toast and jest pass lightly, 
 And all thought of care seems hushed ; 
 
 View the "banquet hall deserted," 
 As morning there her splendor spreads ; 
 
 All the guests have now departed, 
 But with aching hearts and heads. 
 
 The cups are drained ; the deep libation 
 Which on Pleasure's shrine they poured, 
 
 All has proved a vain oblation 
 To the god whom they adored. 
 
 See around the scattered roses, 
 Faded all, and trampled down ; 
 
 The head which now in pain reposes 
 Wore them as a joyous crown. 
 
 Yes ! they thought not of the morrow ; 
 
 Well the precept they obeyed ; 
 No share from future care they borrow, 
 
 Yet by present sweets betrayed. 
 
 Wisdom teaches that the pleasures 
 Which the passing moment brings, 
 
 Like all other earthly treasures, 
 Fly away with hasty wings. 
 
 " Fugit hora ;" swiftly by us 
 Flits the Hour that bears away 
 
 All the sorrows here that try us, 
 All the joys that gild our stay. 
 
STANZAS. 33 
 
 " Fugit hora ;" live then rightly ; 
 
 Take life's pleasure with its pain ; 
 Live as though, when sleeping nightly, 
 
 Thou may'st never wake again ! 
 
40 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 TO HOWARD. 
 
 If I could make my Harp's tone pure and sweet, 
 As freshest odor, on the freshest gale, 
 When healthiest breathings of the spring prevail, 
 Then would it, Howard, be no more than meet, 
 That I should choose its softest strain for thee ; 
 Thou for whose welfare, sick and poor did pray, 
 Thou who thro' poisoned air did'st wend thy way, 
 To heal thy fellow-man in misery ; 
 But my weak strain can only hint thy worth, 
 Thou much-loved blessing to thy fellow-dust, 
 Yet let me utt'rance give to my firm trust, 
 That thou did'st leave for better worlds this earth, 
 And dost in scenes to mortal eye unknown, 
 Rejoice with spirits, lovely as thine own. 
 
 W. J. H. 
 
THE UNMARKED GRAVES. 41 
 
 THE UNMARKED GRAVE*. 
 
 A bleak and lonely burial-place — 
 
 Two graves without a stone — 
 There slumber, in cold Earth's embrace, 
 
 The loved — the early flown. 
 Brother and sister ! side by side 
 
 Their mouldering forms repose ; 
 And, distant far, my heart's full tide 
 
 Heaves to that shrine of woes. 
 
 IT. 
 
 True, Time has rolled his wasting flood 
 
 O'er many changing years, 
 Since near their rest, a child, I stood 
 
 — I have no longer tears. 
 Yet still the thought will sadly press 
 
 On Memory's pensive hours, 
 Of those o'er whose dark lowliness 
 
 Bloom Spring's most fragile flowers. 
 
 III. 
 
 And, westward far, at midnight, swells 
 
 A mother's anxious breast, 
 With dreams of him who lonely dwells, 
 
 Of them who calmly rest: 
 
42 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Unbidden pearls of treasured love 
 
 From that full fount run o'er, 
 As greets she those who here shall move 
 
 That breast to joy no more. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Brother and sister ! well ye sleep 
 
 Within your narrow graves, 
 Undreaming of the spell we keep 
 
 In Memory's crystal caves. 
 Sleep on, beloved ! through all Earth's gloom, 
 
 This joy to us is given, 
 To deem ye victors o'er the tomb, 
 
 And know of such is Heaven. 
 New York, 1838. II. G. 
 
THE NATIVE VILLAGE. 43 
 
 THE NATIVE VILLAGE. 
 
 BY MRS. L.H. SIGOURNEY. 
 
 Sweetly wild, sweetly wild, 
 Were the scenes that charm'd me when a child. 
 Rocks, grey rocks, with their caverns dark, 
 Leaping rills, like the diamond spark, 
 Torrent voices, thundering by, 
 When the pride of the vernal floods swell'd high, 
 And quiet roofs, like the hanging nest, 
 'Mid cliffs, by the feathery foilage drest. 
 
 Beyond, in those woods, did the wild-rose grow, 
 And the lily gleam out where the lakelets flow, 
 And the trailing arbutus shroud its grace, 
 Till its fragrance bewray'd its hiding-place, 
 And the woodbine hold to the dews its cup, 
 And the vine, with its clustering grapes go up, 
 Up, to the crest of the tallest trees, 
 And there, with the humming-birds and bees, 
 On a seat of turf, embroidered fair, 
 With the violet blue and the columbine rare 
 It was sweet to sit, till the sun threw clown 
 At the gate of the west, his golden crown : 
 Sweetly wild, sweetly wild, 
 Were the scenes that chann'd me, when a child. 
 
44 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 THE EXILE'S CAVE. 
 
 Mr country ! when I trod the far-fam'd shores, 
 Along whose sands the Adrian billow roars ; 
 When turn'd from Alpine crags my ling'ring view, 
 And cast tow'rds vanish'd Rome a last adieu ; 
 When down I look'd from many a vine-clad steep, 
 Where Rhine's swift tides of rock and ruin sweep ; 
 When glad I saw, in triumph's stately rest, 
 An hundred fleets on Thames' reposing breast ; 
 Still from each scene mine eye was westward turn'd, 
 Still at thy name the filial feeling burn'd ; 
 And still the stranger join'd that honor'd name 
 With some high word of freedom, praise and fame. 
 Then long'd thy son, his little all to lend, 
 Thy glorious trust to keep, adorn, defend ; 
 Then to his lips the warm thanksgiving sprung, 
 That on thy lot his prizeless birthright hung ; 
 Then kings and kingdoms, mount and ocean, fled, 
 And thy green forests echoed to his tread. 
 'Tvvas nature's call, 'twas duty's sacred vow : 
 Fain would the wand'rer's hand fulfil it now ! 
 Far as thy cities lift the sands of men, 
 Far as thou look'st o'er prairie, wood and glen, 
 Far as thy waters roll to either sea, 
 Thou should'st be stainless, as thou would'st be free : 
 Who shall not seize the moments as they fly, 
 When on their wings immortal blessings lie ! 
 
the exile's cave. 45 
 
 Dearest art thou : yet dear is many a land ; 
 I grasp'd in all a welcome's joyous hand : 
 Oft was the meeting brief, yet sweet the stay ; 
 Unknown I came, in tears I turn'daway : 
 I know not now if yet they linger here, 
 I shall not greet them till the dead appear ; 
 But they have taught the slumb'ring fire to wake, 
 Dear is their country for their mem'ry's sake. 
 So one bright chain all living hearts may bind ; 
 So man was made, was sav'd, to love mankind : 
 So, through each realm the mystic church is spread, 
 Joining the living with th' undying dead, 
 Joining the pure below, the bless'd above, 
 All in His sov'reign name, whose name is love. 
 
 D. E. G. 
 
46 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 SOCRATES. 
 
 BY B. F. WATSON. 
 
 There is no character of all antiquity upon which 
 my mind delights to dwell with such eagerness, as 
 that of the philosopher Socrates. And this, per- 
 haps, is still more increased by the fact, that the 
 more I allow my imagination the effort to picture 
 for itself the man as he was, the greater I find the 
 difficulty of forming a distinct idea of him. And 
 after all, it is more of an idea, than any thing real 
 which used to exist in the form of humanity, that 
 takes possession of my mind. It is not so with 
 Homer : 
 
 " The blind old bard of Scio's rocky isle," 
 
 is distinctly pictured before me, as he sat at the 
 feasts of the great, reciting his immortal strains, or 
 amid the populace of the cities, filling their souls 
 with patriotism — to them the highest virtue — and 
 again at the crowded contests exulting in all the 
 majesty of his superior intellect. Notwithstanding 
 the doubt which has been raised as to the very iden- 
 tity of his existence, and the folios of criticism and 
 the folios of actual denial which have been written, 
 I can discern amidst them all, the very existing, nay 
 the very si,nging Homer. And this is why I am 
 soon satisfied with feasting my thoughts of the old 
 Bard, and turn with pleasure to the feast he has left 
 
SOCRATES. 47 
 
 the minrl — the immortal Iliad. But it is not so with 
 Socrates. He is a phantom which haunts the mind, 
 but which eludes every effort to grasp it. Yet he is 
 the idol of my thoughts. Long before I had learn- 
 ed from the classic page his sayings and doings — 
 even while yet a child — I had read the passionate 
 exclamation of the old blind preacher, which had 
 raised in my youthful mind an idea of the great. I 
 thought that he must have been something more 
 than human, of whom it could be said by such an 
 one as Rosseau, " Socrates died like a Philosopher, 
 but Josus Christ died like a God." What a man 
 must he have been, who could have been thus men- 
 tioned, with one whom we acknowledge to be God 
 in man ! And what a death must a Philosopher 
 die! Such was my first thought of Socrates. And 
 when it is remembered under what circumstances 
 these words of Rosseau were repeated, no wonder 
 that that man took such hold upon the thoughts of 
 the child. It was with all the eloquence and pa- 
 thos of which the gifted Wirt was capable, that he 
 tells the thrilling story. In a simple country church, 
 before a rustic audience, an old and blind but ven- 
 erable man appeared as the preacher of the day. 
 "Never before," says the narrator, " did I listen to 
 such a sermon as that old, blind preacher gave." 
 By his thrilling eloquence he had insensibly raised 
 the feelings of his hearers to the highest state to 
 which they might be wrought— melted them to tears 
 — appeared himself to be lost in the very ecstacies 
 of that exciting moment, and it seemed to be im- 
 possible for human power to bring them down from 
 the height to which he had carried them, without 
 
48 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 destroying the effect ; when suddenly he hurst forth 
 in the exclamation, " Socrates died like a Philoso- 
 pher, but Jesus Christ died like a God' 1 ' 1 — and imme- 
 diately burst into a flood of tears ! The effect was 
 complete.* 
 
 No wonder I say, my idea of Socrates was great, 
 when I first learned of him under such circumstan- 
 ces. But my admiration for him was then mixed 
 with profound ignorance of his character. I grew 
 up, and the ignorance was dispelled, that admira- 
 tion increased, and my wonder was, that such a 
 man lived and died a heathen. But away with such 
 an idea. He was not a Christian, but he was no 
 more a heathen. He was not a Christian, because 
 there was no Christianity : he was not a heathen 
 because heathenism was idolatry. He stood alone 
 in the world, a light amid impenetrable gloom — a 
 morning star, the faint precursor of the light and 
 glory of day ! How pure his morality, for one 
 upon whom the rays of the star which rose in Beth- 
 lehem had never fallen ! How sublime his pre- 
 cepts, for one who had never sat at the feet of 
 Jesus, and learned of him ! How bright he must 
 have shone in the darkness — the moral darkness — 
 with which Athens was then enveloped ! How 
 exalted must he have been, among those who mis- 
 took — but through a wilful ignorance— his one God 
 for a strange and unknown being — his obedience to 
 the dictates of his conscience, for a communion 
 with false spirits — and his gentle teaching of the 
 Athenian youth, for a corruption of their morals ! 
 
 * Wirt's British Spy. 
 
SOCRATES. 49 
 
 Well does Xenophen indignantly exclaim, " how 
 could he, being such an one as he was, do all this." 
 By the consent of all mankind, it seems to have 
 been granted to Socrates to wear that palm, more 
 enduring and more glorious than ever Caesar won 
 amid his seas of blood or fields of slain, or Homer, 
 with his title of Father of Song, or all the simply 
 great who ever lived, either to devastate the world 
 with their destructive aim, or to charm it with their 
 song, or to enlighten it with their philosophy. To 
 Socrates alone is granted the palm of being the best 
 who ever lived, the best who could live, without 
 light from on high. His, is a name before the 
 world, as identified with every thing which is good 
 and great— a name, emblazoned like a sun, with 
 such beams of light, that we, with all our advanta 
 ges for moral and intellectual superiority, shrink 
 back from it with dazzled eyes. 
 
50 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 SCENE FROM A MANUSCRIPT DRAMA. 
 
 BY W. A. C. HOSMER. 
 
 [A OLADK IN THE FOREST.] 
 
 Flying Arrow. 
 
 Your sire is famed for promptness ; what precludes 
 His presence from the council ? 
 
 Neuga. 
 
 I know not : 
 He is much changed of late, and often pays 
 Sad visits to my sister's gory couch ; 
 And breathes his incoherent words of wail 
 To rocks, unsympathizing trees, and lifts 
 His shrivel'd hands in gnashing madness up 
 Invoking retribution from the clouds. 
 On his bald brow hangs gloom, and in the sports, 
 And loud, light laughter of the festal throng 
 He finds no joy. While others join the dance, 
 And move to music round the monarch oak, 
 He seeks some lone, sad haunt, and fires his brain 
 With plans of vengeance, or inures his frame 
 To suffering and hardship on the hills : 
 Aye ! scorning other weapon than his knife, 
 He dares the panther in his lair of rock, 
 Or wrestles with the rough bear in his den, 
 And bares his bosom to the pelting storm 
 
SCENE FROM A MANUSCRIPT DRAMA. 51 
 
 When the dumb beast seeks covert, and beholds 
 The lightning leap through Heaven, and hears the 
 
 while 
 Deep, quailing thunder ; for his mood accords 
 With Nature in her frantic hour of wrath. 
 
 [Enter Swamp Fox.] 
 
 Where is the Sachem ? 
 
 Swamp Fox. 
 
 In the wood shot down ; 
 While walking by my side, the cruel shaft, 
 Dyed to the feather, quivered in his back 
 Before I dreamed of danger ; and he fell, 
 Essaying vainly to articulate. 
 Like panther, in pursuit of deer, I strove 
 To overtake the slayer, fell Magua! 
 But my old limbs, stiff with the weight of years, 
 The foe outmatched in speed. 
 
 Neuga. 
 
 Woes fall so thick, 
 And heavy on my soul, this last great blow 
 Moves not a muscle : so used am I to wrong 
 That all the springs of tenderness are dried. 
 My sister murder'd— wife in bondage dire— 
 My name almost extinct— my country made 
 A theatre of butchery and blood, 
 And finally to crown the ills of Fate 
 My royal father killed outright ; his locks 
 Once white as wintry snow by traitor changed 
 To redness deep and foul. How long shall we 
 
52 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Waste time in words, loud groans and vain regrets, 
 While Ruin unopposed pursues his course ? 
 In the mad conflict quick and glorious death 
 Would suit me better than a life like this. 
 I hear the raven croaking in the wood, 
 Eager to steep his claws and carrion beak 
 In the yet reeking slain — an hour ago 
 Your Sachem and the Ruler of this realm. 
 
 Swamp Fox. 
 
 The white-browed hell hounds from beyond the sea, 
 And the fell traitor, flushed with victory 
 Keep careless watch, and deem the Senecas, 
 Weak, few and panic-struck, no more 
 Will dare oppose their power. 
 
 Ncuga. 
 To-night, to-night I swear 
 My tomahawk shall glitter in their camp — 
 My bow shall twang the fatal note of death, 
 And if I fall, my ghost shall join the dead 
 In the bright West where Ou-wee-nee-you* smiles 
 On Valor passing through his gates of gold. 
 
 Flying Arrow. 
 We follow where you venture, and the light 
 Of morrow's morn shall view our corpses cold ; 
 Or fierce Invasion crushed — our country free. 
 
 * The Great Spirit in Seneca dialect. 
 
iona— fingal's cave. 53 
 
 IONA— FINGAL'S CAVE— GIANT'S CAUSE- 
 WAY. 
 
 BY A TRAVELLER. 
 
 We were landed in a small boat in a sheltered 
 cove at the eastern point of the island. We clam- 
 bered up over the broken pillars to its surface, 
 which is uneven and unrelieved by a single human 
 habitation. A few cattle were grazing here and 
 there, and immense numbers of sea-gulls were 
 wheeling and screaming round the cliffs. But 
 though solitude was there, silence was not. The 
 dashing of the waves along the irregular shore — 
 their deep reverberations along the numerous caves 
 which pierce its sides, made the air all around 
 tremulous with a music in perfect harmony with 
 the scene. After walking a half mile, we effected 
 a descent down the southern face of the island near 
 Olaneshell Cave — which would have detained our 
 steps any where, but in the neighborhood of Fin- 
 gal's Cave or Hall, as it is indiscriminately called. 
 We hurried along the portion of the island which is 
 lined with a range of columns, a little inclining out- 
 wards in the middle, as if bending beneath the su- 
 perincumbent mass of rocks. This too would have 
 repaid a visit to the island, for more than any other 
 portion of Staffa, it gives the impression of human 
 architecture on a magnificent scale. The basaltic 
 
54 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 columns rest nearly vertical upon a rude mass of 
 trap, turf, and support a heavy entablature of trap, 
 without any defined shape except towards the sur- 
 face, where it exhibits the appearance of a tessala- 
 ted pavement. From the foot of this range, far out 
 into the ocean, you see nothing but myriads of bro- 
 ken columns, here piled together as if in readiness 
 to construct other caverns, and there lying in every 
 fantastic position. 
 
 But this was noticed more particular on my re- 
 turn, for I paused not, till I stood on the Causeway, 
 which leads into Fingal's Hall on the eastern side — 
 and here opened a view into the twilight depths of 
 that vast temple, which will never pass from my 
 memory. No edifice raised by human hands — no 
 sculptured dome —no fretted vault, " where peal- 
 ing anthems swelled the notes of praise"— no long 
 drawn aisles, not even at night, 
 
 When the pillared arches were over my head, 
 And beneath my feet were the bones of the dead — 
 
 ever impressed me with such deep solemnity. 
 
 The entrance of the Hall is 63 feet from the sur- 
 face of the water at the average tide, and 40 feet in 
 breadth, and is in the form of a gothic arch, or 
 rather of the contracted gothic arch, reminding me 
 forcibly of the natural bridges of Virginia. Its ex- 
 treme depth, from Dr. MacCulloch's measurement, 
 is 227 feet. The walls are not parallel to each oth- 
 er, nor have the columns which compose it that 
 geometrical precision I was led to expect from en- 
 graved representations. This, instead of impairing 
 
iona— fingal's cave. 55 
 
 the grandeur of its effect, imparts to it a grace be- 
 yond the reach of art. The columns are not of 
 uniform size and height, but vary from 2 to 4 feet 
 in diameter, and from 20 to 44 feet in length, and 
 are generally 5 or 6 sided. Their color is a dark 
 grayish black. The form of the vault does not con- 
 tinue the same as at the entrance, but is in some 
 places almost flat— in others faultless in its archi- 
 tectural regularity — and near the centre, where it is 
 formed of the ends of broken pillars, it bends down- 
 wards a little. Carbonate of lime has filtered 
 through the interstices of the pillars at the centre 
 and near the extremity of the vault, forming an 
 exquisite chasing round their edges. The ocean 
 rolls its waves to the very extreme of the cavern, 
 and of course forms its floor. Its color is an eme- 
 rald green, and its reflected tints, mingling with the 
 chequered light and shade, which the irregular 
 outline of the walls necessarily produces, add much 
 to the harmonious effect of the cavern. Each wave, 
 as it ranged in rapid succession by the sides and 
 dashed against the extremity of the vault, produced 
 an organ-like tone, which, echoing along the irregu- 
 lar roof, fills the whole cavern with a wild and ap- 
 propriate music. 
 
 The pillared rocks their silent voices raise— 
 The deep sea murmurs her Creator's praise. 
 
 The cave can be penetrated with perfect safety 
 to the extremity, over the broken pillars, which 
 forms a rude corridor or stairway. The view from 
 that point should not be lost from any false appro- 
 
56 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 hension of danger. There is none. The entrance 
 fronts towards Iona, and the ruins of its cathedral 
 are distinctly visible in the distance— a type of the 
 perishableness of man's proudest work, when com- 
 pared with the stabilily of a structure like this. 
 The best point of view, however, is either about 
 half way up the eastern side, or else just out of the 
 cavern, on the causeway which extends down into 
 the sea. At these two points the mass of light is 
 broken by the projecting columns — the reflected 
 tints of the ocean — the twilight of the vault — the 
 organ-like tone and echo of the breaking surge — 
 are I think more harmoniously blended. However, 
 this will all depend on the hour, the tide, and the 
 weather. There is no one point of observation, if 
 the visiter can have but one, which will not add to 
 the treasure of his imagination and memory forever. 
 
 Our party did not explore the other caverns of 
 the island. They are all inferior in dimensions and 
 interest to Fingal's. I should mention that the high- 
 est point on the face of the island is 112 feet. 
 
 On our way back to Oban, my mind was busy 
 with the wild speculations which the wonders of 
 Staffa are so well calculated to lead to. I was 
 questioning the past of its origin— of the progress 
 of this structure, raised by agencies which mock 
 the imbecility of human hands— of its long unre- 
 corded history, for it is but within fifty years that 
 its existence was known. What convulsive throes 
 must have shook the ocean and the land — what red 
 fires must have glared on the heavens, when the 
 earthquake and volcano reared these innumerable 
 pillars with the whole entablature of the island 
 
IONA — fingal's cave. 57 
 
 upon them ! And was there a time, when a mag- 
 nificent range of columns, a giant causeway in- 
 deed, stretched from Scotland to Ireland, which the 
 strong arm of the ocean has broken down, leaving 
 only a fragment here and there to tell of its former 
 grandeur ! We have the authority of Poetry on 
 this point, and Science may doubt, it cannot dis- 
 prove the fact. 
 
THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 LINES 
 
 BY REV. R. TURNBUIX. 
 
 Sweet is Summer's vivid ray, 
 Dawning on the limpid wave, 
 
 Sweet is music's magic lay, 
 In some wild Eolian cave. 
 
 Sweet on infant's lip the smile 
 
 As it rests in balmy sleep, 
 O'er its little couch the while, 
 
 The mother hangs with pleasure deep. 
 
 Sweet the moonbeam on the wave, 
 Gilding all its heaving breast, 
 
 As it shows the watery grave, 
 Where the hero sunk to rest. 
 
 Sweet is memory's mystic spell, 
 Conjuring up our youthful joys ; 
 
 Hope's bland whisper ! who can tell ' 
 The power of her enchanting voice ? 
 
 Sweeter far is Mercy's ray 
 Beaming on a world of woe, 
 
 (fighting up a glorious day 
 'Mid the gloom of life below. 
 
 Sweeter too, the balmy rest 
 Of the grave's unbroken sleep, 
 
 While the soul on Jesus' breast 
 Far away forgets to weep. 
 
LINES. 
 
 Sweeter still the holy lay 
 Sung by happy saints on high, 
 
 'Mid the beams of endless day, 
 'Mid the glories of the sky ! 
 
 59 
 
60 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 THE FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH. 
 
 BY J. DIXON. 
 
 " A tradition prevailed among the natives of Puerto 
 Rico, that in the Island of Bimini, one of the Lucayos, 
 there was a fountain of such wonderful virtue, as to 
 renew the youth, and recall the vigor, of every one 
 who bathed in its salutary waters. In hopes of find- 
 ing this grand restorative, Ponce de Leon and his fol- 
 lowers, ranged through the islands, searching with 
 fruitless solicitude and labor, for this wonderful foun- 
 tain." Robertson's History of America. 
 
 O ! where is that fountain of Youth ! 
 
 To the far, green land, where its waters flow, 
 Ere our last hopes fade in the light of truth, 
 
 With a fainting heart we go : 
 We have toiled for the mines of yellow gold 
 Till our eyes are dim and our blood is cold. — 
 We have gained the glittering prize we sought, 
 But our wealth, at the price of life, is bought ; — 
 The light of our youth, like a dream, is past, 
 And the shadow of deatli is over us cast; 
 In our hearts the magic of hope has died, 
 And what that can cheer us, is left beside 1 
 The gold we have heaped can ne'er restore 
 The wealth of the soul — that richer ore — 
 And the light of youth, that has ceased to bum, 
 To our cheerless age, may not return. 
 
THE FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH. 61 
 
 O ! where is that fountain of Youth ! 
 
 When our spirits were flushed by the glow of 
 health, 
 From our childhood's home, we were urged away, 
 
 By the sordid lust of wealth. 
 We came from the castled hills of Spain, 
 
 From tented field and lady's bower, 
 In a slender bark o'er the heaving main, 
 
 To the land of sun and shower : — 
 We came— and the sparkling rivers roll'd, 
 In all their course, o'er a bed of gold, 
 And the earth gave up a richer spoil, 
 Than the wealth of kings, to our ceaseless toil, 
 But O ! for a single year, to recall 
 The flush of youth, we would give it all. 
 
 They left their treasures of gold, and sought 
 
 For that fountain of life, whose waters gave 
 The freshness of youth, to him who brought 
 
 His trembling limbs to its healing wave. 
 They roamed o'er mountain and desert plain, 
 
 For many a weary day, in vain, 
 Wherever a foaming stream might, rush 
 
 O'er rock, or green hill-side, 
 Or hidden fountain gently gush, 
 
 Or noiseless river glide. 
 Twas vain ! for the blessed fount of life 
 
 Whose waters to men are given, 
 Flows not in this world of sin and strife, 
 
 But only is found in Heaven : 
 
62 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 And thus in the brightness of youth we seek 
 
 The thronging woes of later years, 
 Till care has blanched the blooming cheek, 
 
 And dimmed the eye with tears : 
 We dream not that the cloudless sun 
 
 That made our youthful pathway bright, 
 When hope's most brilliant prize is won, 
 
 Will lose its morning light. 
 We dream not that the power and wealth 
 
 For which we give our life, 
 Will not repay the wasted health. 
 The bitterness — the strife — 
 The agony, with which we earn 
 The splendors that the soul must spurn, 
 In that inevitable day, 
 When glory's hues shall fade away 
 And Gold's omnipotence shall be 
 A torturing, maddening mockery. 
 
 When the ebbing pulse and the gasping breath 
 Are weak and faint in the hour of death, 
 O ! then could a fountain of Youth 
 In the desert of life, break forth, 
 Which could bring us back to that blessed hour, 
 When the gilded visions of hope had power 
 To cheer the gloom of this dreary earth, 
 How would we gladly — gladly fling 
 
 Our wealth away, in that hour of pain, 
 For a sight of that celestial spring, 
 Whose waters might make us young again ! 
 
THE YOUNG MOTHER. 63 
 
 THE YOUNG MOTHER. 
 
 Willis. 
 
 " Blessed we sometimes are ! and I am now 
 Happy in quiet feelings." 
 
 Mark yonder scene ! a cherub boy 
 With lisping shout and frolic glee, 
 
 Which well betoken childhood's joy — 
 Is climbing to his mother's knee. 
 
 And blended on that mother's face 
 Are all the charms which beauty lends ; 
 
 And her's the form of seraph grace, 
 Which o'er the sculptor's slumber bends, 
 
 And smiles are o'er her beauty stealing, 
 Irradiate with the light of thought, 
 
 Unuttered tones, yet well revealing 
 The love with which her heart is fraught. 
 
 The roguish boy ! his sportive hands 
 Have torn the roses from her hair, 
 
 And loosed her tresses from their bands 
 Upon a bosom snowy fair ! 
 
 And she has only pressed a kiss 
 Of burning fervor on his brow ! 
 
 As if she felt too much of bliss 
 To give one word of chiding now ! 
 
61 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Oh, if thine heart he weighed with sadness, 
 Which makes the spirit pine to go, 
 
 Then gaze upon this scene of gladness, 
 And learn, that there is bliss below ! 
 June, 1834. B. 
 
TO CATHARINE. 65 
 
 TO CATHARINE. 
 
 BY REV. J. D. TYLER. 
 
 We laid thee in the softest spot, 
 
 That sorrowing love could choose, 
 Where gently blows the passing breeze, 
 
 Where fall the early dews, 
 Where brightest flowers of early spring, 
 
 In fragrant beauty bloom, 
 And droop their soft sweet heads, as if 
 
 In sorrow o'er thy tomb ! 
 Yet dreary is the softest grave 
 
 Affection ever made — 
 And earthly flowers of brightest hue, 
 
 Will ever soonest fade. 
 
 But thou art gone where calmly blow 
 
 The pure sweet airs of heaven, — 
 Where round thy bright celestial brow 
 
 Immortal wreaths are woven — 
 For faith in that one name alone 
 
 That erring man can save, 
 Or give the prisoned soul release 
 
 And triumph o'er the grave, 
 lias clothed thy new-born soul in robes 
 
 Of righteousness and love, 
 And, like the Prophet's chariot-flame, 
 
 Has wafted thee above. 
 5 
 
66 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 How sweet the blessed tones that steal 
 
 From o'er thy early grave ! 
 How glad the ransomed voices breathe 
 
 To Him who died to save ! 
 We will not weep that thou art dead, 
 
 Thou loved ami lovely one ! 
 We will not sorrow o'er the voice 
 
 That called thee to thy home ! 
 We will not grieve that thou hast flown 
 
 From ills that met thee here, 
 To Him who healeth every pain, 
 
 And wipeth every tear ! 
 
G7 
 
 SONNETS. 
 BY J . nxoN. 
 
 I. 
 
 MOONLIGHT IN JUNE. 
 
 Thou hast a gentle ministry, O ! Moon ! 
 
 Hiding in solemn silence through the sky, 
 
 And gazing from thy trackless path on high 
 Upon the beauty of the leafy June : 
 On such a lovely night, I ween, as this, 
 Endymion felt thy pale lips' dewy kiss, 
 For far around on every plain and hill, 
 
 In the soft gleaming of the silver ray, 
 Flower, tree and forest, breathless now and still, 
 
 Rest from the burning brightness of the day ; 
 Silence is over all. Yon murmuring rill 
 
 Alone leaps gladly on its tireless way : 
 In thy soft rays how beautiful is night. 
 Like man's cloud covered path, by Woman's love 
 made bright ! 
 
 II, 
 
 TO A ROBIN. 
 
 Sweet bird ! that hidden by the dark green leaves, 
 
 Did'st pour thy pleasant song at break of day, 
 Making glad music 'round my flower wreathed 
 eaves, 
 
68 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Why has thy gentle warbling died away ? 
 Come not the zephyrs from the sweet south-west, 
 As freshly to thy leaf-embosomed nest 7 
 Less fragrant are the flowers of Summer's prime, 
 Or pinest thou for thy far-off southern clime 1 
 Or is it that thy noisy young have flown, 
 
 Leaving their green home in the o'er shadowing 
 tree, 
 That thus thou mournest, desolate and lone, 
 
 Where once thy song burst forth so loud and free? 
 Alas ! that summer's perfumed airs should bring 
 Sorrow to one like thee, so light of heart and wing ! 
 
 HI. 
 
 A RAMBLE IN THE WOODS. 
 
 The soft, sweet music of the forest birds, 
 The fragrance of wild flowers, the solemn hush 
 
 Of the dark woods, more eloquent than words, 
 The murmuring sound of summer streams, that 
 rush 
 
 O'er flowers and bended grass, our souls beguile, 
 
 And tempt our wandering feet for many a mile. 
 
 Through the green leaves we look to yon deep sky- 
 Blue as the Ocean — stretching far around, 
 And feel our souls — to earth no longer bound — 
 
 Spreading their eagle wings to soar on high. 
 
 O ! in this perfect stillness, how the heart 
 
 Pants for that power, that is its better part ; 
 
 And 'mid the teachings of these trees and flowers 
 
 Sighs o'er the memory of its wasted hours ! 
 
SONNETS 69 
 
 IV. 
 
 SUNSET AFTER A STORM. 
 
 Lo ! where the mountains mingle with the sky, 
 A breaking light in all the glowing west ! 
 
 And slowly now its lustre spreads on high, 
 As the veil'd sun sinks calmly to his rest : 
 
 The broken clouds are bathed in golden light, 
 That mingles sweetly with the sky's deep blue, 
 
 And as the twilight fades — from Heaven's far height 
 The first bright star of eve is shining through: 
 
 The low wind's voice falls gently on the ear, 
 And with it, to the lone and weary heart, 
 Comes a deep joy, that could it ne'er depart, 
 
 Might make us sigh to dwell forever here : 
 
 It may not be ! E'en from such glorious skies, 
 
 O I who can tell how sad a morn may rise ! 
 
 MONTE VIDEO. 
 
 The wind blows cool around the mountain's brow, 
 And its shades there breathes a purer air ; 
 Thrill'd by the glorious scene, our souls may share 
 
 A portion of its majesty. If thou 
 
 Would'st know the thoughts that sleep within 
 thee, — go 
 
 To yonder mount ;— there with the world below, 
 
 And the blue sky above thee, shall thy soul 
 Range forth, and wild, strange visions crowd 
 Upon thy brain, till the heart beats aloud, 
 
 And the far soaring spirit mocks control. 
 
70 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Gazing in rapture there— think if this height 
 Can stir thy senses with such deep delight, 
 What joy is theirs, who gaze with angel eyes 
 From Heaven's far heights, that gleam beyond the 
 skies ! 
 
 VI. 
 
 WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 Where in the wanton air the dark woods wave, 
 In every verdant plain — by rock and stream — 
 Where the swift waters in the sunshine gleam, 
 
 Or, sleeping in the shade, their green banks lave, 
 
 Bright flowers are blooming, and the zephyr's wing 
 Is laden with their fragrance. Come away 
 
 From the throng'd city's busy hum, and fling 
 The fetter from thy soul for one brief day. 
 
 The winds from these wild flowers to thee shall bear 
 Sweet odors, and their soft and delicate hues, 
 Bathed in a nightly shower of summer dews, 
 
 Shall fill thee with delight, and wandering there 
 
 A loftier hope — a nobler, prouder aim 
 
 Amid these sinless flowers, thy life shall claim. 
 
 VII. 
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 The skies of Autumn wear a deeper blue, 
 The moon and stars pour down a purer light ; 
 And lo ! the magic frost, in one brief night, 
 
 Hath robed the forest in a brighter hue. 
 Go where the mellow sunshine softly plays, 
 
SONNETS. 71 
 
 And there, by plain or hill-side, thou shalt hear 
 Sounds sweeter far than charmed thy listening ear, 
 
 When songs of birds beguiled the summer days : 
 —Sweet sounds, but sad— the low and murmuring 
 wail 
 
 Of Autumn winds that sigh among the trees, 
 Telling, of Death, a wild and mournful tale, 
 
 And forcing solemn Thought on minds at ease. 
 Oh ! if our hearts may thus be wiser made, 
 'T were well that leaves should fall and flowers 
 should fade. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 BIRCH WOOD BOWER. 
 
 On the green summit of a gentle hill, 
 
 O'er hung with vines, there stands a verdant 
 bower — 
 
 A lovely spot at the sweet sunset hour, 
 When skies are clear and Autumn winds are still. 
 
 The golden sun, the fleeting clouds, the sky, 
 From this fair bower, as bright and glorious seem 
 As when we see, in some bewildering dream, 
 
 The sky, the clouds, the sun of Italy. 
 Where is that heaven of darker, purer blue ? — 
 
 Where is that happier clime, whose trees and 
 flowers 
 May boast a deeper green— a gayer hue, 
 
 Than those we see in this sweet land of ours? 
 Gazing from such a spot — at such a time, 
 Well may our hearts believe earth has no fairer 
 clime ! 
 
72 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 IX. 
 
 THE HARVEST MOON. 
 
 Milt* were her beams, and light her graceful horn, 
 
 When first her slender crescent hung on high ; 
 Now, like the breaking of another morn, 
 
 She bathes in silver light the eastern sky. 
 They say with hastening step, at set of sun, 
 
 She comes, the Autumn harvest home to light; 
 And when our woods, and hills, and streams have 
 won 
 
 Her beaming eye, she lingers o'er the sight. 
 How doth her beauty sink upon the heart !— 
 
 Waking the thoughts we cannot breathe in words, 
 O'er which our saddened spirits brood apart, 
 
 And sigh to break their chains, and soar like birds. 
 Strange, that the beauty of her gentle beams 
 Should make us sad, as when we wake from pleas- 
 ant dreams ! 
 
 X. 
 
 A SUMMER DAY IN AUTUMN. 
 
 A warm, bright, sunny day, like one of those 
 That thrill'd our hearts when earth was gay with 
 
 flow'rs, 
 And leaves were fresh in all the forest bowers ! 
 
 The fragrant Summer lingers, ere she goes 
 From her green haunts beside the cooling brook, 
 With a sad beauty, like the last fond look 
 
SONNETS. 73 
 
 Of one we love. The melancholy sky, 
 
 The fading leaves, the withering grass, the dim 
 And hazy light, have, to the gazer's eye, 
 
 A mournful charm ; and hark ! the funeral hymn 
 Of the last summer-day is on the breeze, 
 Mocking the brightness of the tinted trees ; 
 And gently o'er the earth, with dying swell, 
 The lingering zephyr sighs its last farewell ! 
 
 XI. 
 
 THE BIRDS OF SUMMER. 
 
 From the deep stillness of the Autumn woods, 
 From rustling streams half choked with fallen 
 
 leaves, 
 From leafless bowers, where gentle Summer 
 weaves 
 Her vines and flowers no more, and sadness broods 
 O'er all around, — on sweeping wings they fly 
 To fairer climes beneath a milder sky : 
 Hush'd are the notes that filled, at break of day, 
 The forest shades, since these sweet birds have 
 
 flown, 
 And now, instead, a sad and fitful tone, 
 Comes on the wintry breeze, and dies away. 
 Thus doth the music of our youth depart, 
 And comes no more to cheer the broken heart ! 
 But Spring, with fragrant breath shall come again, 
 And birds, amid its flowers, shall pour a sweeter 
 strain. 
 
74 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 XII. 
 THE LAST DAYS OF AUTUMN. 
 
 The lingering summer wind has passed away, 
 The flowers that bloom beneath the Autumn skies, 
 With their bright hues no longer greet our eyes, 
 
 Tempting our feet o'er hill and plain to stray. 
 
 AVhere in deep woods, we sought the cooling breeze, 
 Dark were the shades, when all around was bright, 
 
 Now through the branches of the leafless trees, 
 The noonday sun pours iu a flood of light. 
 
 The sounds and sights of Summer come no more, 
 To charm our thoughts away, and now we turn 
 Inward the soul upon itself, and learn 
 
 Of our own hearts, the dark and bidden lore, 
 
 And cease to mourn that Autumn's wither'd flowers 
 
 Are emblems of this fading life of ours ! 
 
 XIII. 
 
 MIDNIGHT. 
 
 Voiceless as the dim visions of a dream, 
 Steals the frost-spirit through the wintry air, — 
 
 From leafless forest and from ice-bound stream, 
 No more the winds their gentle music bear. 
 
 The white clouds float in yonder cold blue sky, 
 Pure as the snow, that o'er the frozen plain 
 Glitters beneath the Moon, and bears no stain 
 
 Upon its vestal cheek !— Oh ! if thine eye 
 Looks with delight, upon a nobler scene, 
 Than Autumn's tinted woods, or Summer's green, 
 
SONNETS. 75 
 
 Come forth at this still, solemn, midnight hour, 
 And read a lesson of eternal power, 
 
 And bow thy soul to Him whose tireless hand 
 Hung the proud arch on high, beneath whose light 
 we stand ! 
 
 XIV. 
 
 A WINTER ROBIN. 
 
 Through Autumn's sunny days, one lonely bird 
 
 Lingered, in sadness, by its summer nest, 
 And now the wintry blasts, at midnight heard, 
 
 Ruffle the plumes that shield its downy breast. 
 Perhaps to that lone tree, its gentle mate 
 
 Fled from the fowler's aim, — to droop and die, 
 And fondly there the faithful bird doth wait, 
 
 Breasting the storms that through the valley fly. 
 Our doors it seeks, with warble faint and low, 
 
 And oft its foot-prints you may see at morn, 
 Press'd deeply in the light and yielding snow, 
 
 Where some kind hand its simple food hath borne ; 
 And yet it trusts not man: — its trembling form 
 A mightier hand shall guard from wind and storm. 
 
 XV. 
 
 THE DEPARTED YEAR. 
 
 Midnight ! The Year is fled. Turn back thine eye 
 Along thy path of life, and mark the way, 
 
 O'er which thy soul, with many a tear and sigh, 
 Hath reach'd the dying Year's departing day ; — 
 
76 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Hopes blighted— love estranged, and friends grown 
 cold, 
 
 The gorgeous dreams of youth in darkness lost— 
 These are the wrecks our sadden'd eyes behold 
 
 On life's dark sea, all wild and tempest-toss'd ; 
 Or if thy way were deck'd with tree and flower, 
 
 And calm blue skies were brightly o'er thee spread, 
 'Twere well that solemn thought, at this lone hour, 
 
 Should whisper — know thy happiest year is fled ! 
 Hark ! on the breeze the lingering echoes swell : 
 Thy voice is hush'd ! thou dying year— farewell ! 
 
 XVI. 
 
 THE NEW YEAR. 
 
 Witii eyes that beam with joy, and radiant smiles, 
 
 We grr et the coining of the new-born Year : 
 Our spirits still — forgetful of its wiles, 
 
 Undying Hope with magic light doth cheer. 
 What dreams are ours ! The fragrant breath of 
 spring, 
 
 The flowers of summer, and the autumn skies, 
 Before this opening year be past, shall bring 
 
 New bliss and beauty to our hearts and eyes ; 
 Oh ! tell us not, with sorrow's sickening blight 
 
 The phantom, Hope — shall mock our souls again, 
 Say not that trusting in its litful light, 
 
 We dream of joy, and wake to bitter pain ; 
 But render Jhanks to Heav'n, that flowers conceal 
 In all our way, the thorns that time may yet reveal. 
 
77 
 
 XVII. 
 
 MORNING. 
 
 How doth the spirit turn, on such a morn, 
 From the vain turmoil and the bitter strife, 
 In which we waste the golden hours of life, 
 
 To gentler themes untinged by hate or scorn, — 
 
 To him whose heart by hope is not forsaken, 
 Sweetly and gladly comes the breath of spring; 
 
 And buried thoughts, that with its odors waken, 
 Come like forgotten dreams on memory's wing ; 
 
 And e'en to saddest hearts, as on the ear 
 Melts the rich music of the first bird's song, 
 
 Departed hopes, too bright to linger here, 
 Return, " an undistinguishable throng." 
 
 Alas that every dream our hearts may cherish, 
 
 Is doomed, like Spring's first buds and flowers, to 
 perish ! 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 SPRING, 
 
 From the strong fetters of the wintry frost, 
 
 The streams exulting leap along their way, 
 And flowers whose gentle hues our eyes had lost, 
 
 By the blue river open to the day : 
 Life in its fairest forms is bursting forth 
 
 O'er forest plain and mountain; — nor alone 
 In the fresh beauties of the blooming earth, 
 
 Is the strange magic of the spring time shown, 
 
78 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Wc feci it in our breasts, and bear within, 
 A heart that leaps like the unfettered streams, 
 
 And from the light that smiles around, we win, 
 E'en in our darkest hours, some transient gleams, 
 
 To cheer us on that way, so dark and lone, 
 
 Along whose desert sands, some scattered flowers 
 are strown. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 THE VOICE OF SPRING. 
 
 From budding flowers, and trees that on the air 
 
 Shed odors sweeter than Elysian gales, 
 There comes a voice, forbidding to despair, 
 
 Vyhen every hope that cheered our spirit fails. 
 If in thy madness thou hast dreamed of bliss, 
 
 And wept to see the blessed hope depart, 
 Go forth alone at such an hour as this, 
 
 And let these Zephyrs soothe thy wounded heart : 
 To the dim eye shall come a beaming light, 
 
 To the pale cheek a fresh and radiant bloom, 
 And strength be thine in sorrow's deepest night, 
 
 To bear, with manly soul, the darkest doom ; 
 For in these opening buds we see the power, 
 That to the winter of the heart sends many a sunny 
 hour. 
 
 XX. 
 
 THE CITY AND THE COUNTRY. 
 
 The voice of singing birds— the fragrant kiss 
 Of the flower scented breezes — sun and sky, 
 
 Wild flowers that blossom in the wilderness, 
 And wither there unseen by human eye — 
 
SONNETS. 79 
 
 How do our fettered spirits sigh for these, 
 
 Prison'd within a city's naked walls, 
 Where to the brow may come no forest breeze, 
 
 And on the ear no forest music falls- 
 Turn wheresoe'cr we may, our eyes behold 
 
 The wan, pale checks of sad and care worn men, 
 No leaf is green — no blooming flowers unfold, 
 
 Like those whose hues are bright in vale and glen ; 
 Yet may one sight glad dreams of these recall — 
 The blue and blessed sky that bendeth over all. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 MAY. 
 
 Month of my heart ! — in beauty and in bloom, 
 
 With blossoming trees, mild sunny skies, and soft 
 Sweet southern breezes laden with perfume, 
 Thy happy hours steal on, and wandering oft 
 With a full heart that sighs in vain to fling 
 Like a chained bird, the fetter from its wing, 
 Beside thy rushing streams, I seem to tread 
 A purer soil than Tempe's flowery vales, 
 A sky more blue bends brightly o'er my head, 
 More fresh thy dewy flowers — more soft thy gales, 
 — More sweet the music floating on thy air, 
 The purple flush of morn and eve, more fair, 
 Than when we droop beneath a summer sun, 
 And pant for these sweet streams that through thy 
 valleys run. 
 
pO THE MOSS-ROSE- 
 
 XXII. 
 CONNECTICUT RIVER. 
 
 Wandering 'mid flowery banks, or loud and hoarse, 
 
 Foaming o'er rock and crag, all wild and free, 
 From the deep woods that hide thy shaded source, 
 To where thy waters mingle with the sea, 
 Beautiful River ! like a dream of love 
 Thy deep waves glide— blue as the sky above. 
 Bright are the happy homes along thy shores, 
 
 Shaded by drooping elms that kiss thy wave; 
 And grassy banks that bloom with gay wild flowers, 
 Thy calm and murmuring waters gently lave ; 
 And warbling birds with music sweet as thine, 
 Ping in the brandies of the o'er-hanging vine — 
 A song wbosc notes are with ns evermore, 
 Stealing our hearts away to wander by thy shore. 
 
stanzas" 81 
 
 STANZAS. 
 
 BY REV. J. D. TYLER. 
 "lam a stranger in the earth."— Psalm cxix. 19. 
 
 And thus it is — from spot to spot, 
 
 Our weary footsteps go, 
 By few beloved, by more forgot, 
 
 And homeless here below. 
 
 No spot so calm, no scene so sweet, 
 
 That we may linger there— 
 Our stay is brief, our pleasures fleet, 
 
 For we are strangers here. 
 
 The friends that aid our toilsome way, 
 And cheer its deepening gloom, 
 
 Too bright for earth, pass day by day, 
 Before us to the tomb. 
 
 While robbed of rest, condemned to rove, 
 
 We tread life's weary path, 
 We raise our longing eyes above, 
 
 As "strangers in the eaith." 
 
 By ills beset, by dangers prest, 
 
 By fearful tempests driven, 
 Our cheering hope is promised rest, 
 
 A home prepared in heaven ! 
 6 
 
82 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 BONNET. 
 
 BY PARK BENJAMIN. 
 
 Think not, oh gentle lady, that I grieve, 
 
 That we should ever in this world have met ; 
 For of the past Fate never can bereave — 
 
 And Memory culls unladed roses yet 
 In the sweet garden where Affection grew. 
 
 Time never can restore our Eden hours, 
 Nor the lost happiness of love renew ; 
 
 For me a sword flames o'er those sunny bowers, 
 And a stern. angel beckons me away : — 
 Yet where, deserted and alone, I stray 
 On the rough paths of life, afar from thee, 
 
 Some fragrant airs come wafted from the skies, 
 Some lovely glimpses of the land I see, 
 
 Which to my trusting heart appeared a Paradise ! 
 New York, October 30. 
 
POOL OF BETHESDA. 83 
 
 POOL OF BETHESDA. 
 
 The Savior saw the summer sun o'er Cana's heights 
 
 decline, 
 Where at the marriage feast lie turned the water 
 
 into wine : 
 And dark the shades of night came down upon the 
 
 eastern sea, 
 Which rolls its hlue and sounding waves in ancient 
 
 Galilee. 
 
 On to Jerusalem he came — nor paused the leagues 
 to count — 
 
 Through Bethany and green Bethpage, over the 
 Olive Mount; 
 
 And entering by the eastern gate his weary way he 
 kept, 
 
 To where Bethesda's healing pool beneath the sun- 
 shine slept. 
 
 Around its brink in sad array affliction's sons were 
 
 laid, 
 On whom were poured the heavy ills no human 
 
 power could aid. 
 There waited they, till o'er the wave an angel's 
 
 wing should move : 
 And he who first might wash therein its healing gift 
 
 would prove. 
 
84 
 
 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 There was the blind, whose life had been one train 
 of darkened hours, 
 
 Who never saw the cheering sun, or the fresh- 
 springing dowers : 
 
 Though voices sweet and bounding steps came round 
 his pathway dim, 
 
 No smile of friend, nor look of love, could give their 
 light to him. 
 
 There were the feeble and the maimed, the withered 
 
 and the lame, 
 Yet with a child-like trustfulness to the blue wave 
 
 they came ; 
 And Hope, whose star had almost set upon their 
 
 clouded night, 
 Now plumed her worn and weary wings, and waved 
 
 her banner bright. 
 
 Fair was the sabbath morn which smiled upon the 
 
 gathering throng, 
 But one was there with sandal soiled by journey 
 
 faint and long, 
 Who could not pass the suffering by, or pity's meed 
 
 refuse, 
 And round in idle wonder stood the unbelieving 
 
 Jews. 
 
 In the green summer of his days more helpless than 
 
 a child, 
 Was one to whom the Savior turned with voice and 
 
 aspect mild. 
 " Thou hast seen many saddened years of weariness 
 
 and pain ; 
 Wouldst thou rejoice in strength restored ? wouldst 
 
 thou be whole again 7" 
 
POOL OF BETHESDA. 85 
 
 " Would the wrecked mariner be glad a saving sail 
 
 to see 1 
 Or the bond-slave refuse the aid which bids him 
 
 wander free 1 
 But oh ! all vainly do I hope the healing wave to 
 
 win, 
 Ere I can move my helpless limbs another steps 
 
 therein." 
 
 " No longer shall a powerless frame join with a 
 
 soaring soul 
 To war against thy happiness— arise and be thou 
 
 whole!" 
 And many doubting eyes looked on the wondrous 
 
 cure to see, 
 As forth amid the crowd he walked with step and 
 
 action free. 
 
 Trust we in Him— unlike the Jews who would not 
 
 faith be taught, 
 E'en by the many miracles the blessed Jesus 
 
 wrought — 
 And come to him, with all our woes, who healing 
 
 can impart, 
 E'en for the deepest, worst disease — the sickness of 
 
 the heart. 
 
86 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 THE LAND. 
 
 BY G. M. SNOW. 
 1. 
 
 Oh give me to tread the steadfast earth, 
 With a firm step bold and free ; 
 
 For surely a rood of land is worth 
 More than an acre of sea : 
 
 The pleasure that lies in the deep, deep sea, 
 
 It lieth too deep for me. 
 
 The tiller I leave where the fierce winds blow, 
 
 And I'll be a tiller of ground ; 
 The only bark that I wish to know, 
 
 Is the bark of my faithful hound : 
 For the pleasure that lies in the deep, deep sea, 
 It lieth too deep for me. 
 
 A summer-day's cruise 'neath a squalless sky 
 
 Is doubtless a right merry thing : 
 As swiftly past cape and headland we fly 
 
 On our sea gull's snowy wing : 
 Yet the pleasure that lies in the deep, deep sea, 
 It lieth too deep for me. 
 
8? 
 
 Though to woo the sea may be full of bliss, 
 
 Whilst her voice is sweet and low- 
 Yet her wavelet lips seem meeting your kiss, 
 
 When you reel to the might of a blow. 
 Oh ! the pleasure that lies in the deep, deep sea, 
 It lieth too deep for me. 
 
 5. 
 Then the night-cap'd waves grow wild in their 
 glee, 
 And the wooer grows queerish and pale, 
 And the tribute he oflers his mistress, the sea, 
 
 It seemeth of little avail : 
 Oh ! the pleasure that lies in the deep, deep sea, 
 It lieth too deep for me. 
 
 The perfumed earth for a bride I take, 
 
 And our nuptial couch of flowers 
 Shall be placed by the brink of some reedy lake, 
 
 Where Nature rules the Hours : 
 For the pleasure that lies in the deep, deep sea, 
 It lieth too deep for me. 
 
 There the music tones of each brooklet and bird, 
 And the wind through the old woods sweeping, 
 
 In our leafy home shall alone be heard 
 While our tryst we are fondly keeping : 
 
 Oh ! the pleasure that lies in the deep, deep sea, 
 
 It lieth tco deep for me. 
 
S THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 8. 
 
 Oh give me to tread the steadfast earth, 
 With a firm step bold and free ; 
 
 For surely a rood of land is worth 
 More than an acre of sea : 
 
 The pleasure that lies in the deep, deep sea, 
 
 It lieth too deep for me. 
 
CLARENCE DE COUCY. 89 
 
 CLARENCE DE COUCY. 
 
 BY JOHN T. WAIT. 
 
 "In winter's tedious night, sit by the fire 
 With good old folks, and let them tell thee tales 
 Of woful ages long ago betid ; 
 And ere thou bid good-night, to quit their grief, 
 Tell them the lamentable fall of me." 
 
 Richard II. 
 
 It was midnight, — and the brazen cressets, which 
 swung from the lofty ceiling of the castle chamber, 
 threw a glaring light upon its dark oaken wainscot 
 and ancient massive furniture. Heavily set in 
 richly gilded frames, and hanging on one side of 
 the room, were the portraits of the former Marquis- 
 es De Coucy, who in centuries past ha4 been the 
 firmest pillars of the throne of France ; many of 
 whom had swayed her councils, and many fought 
 and fallen on her battle-fields. There was Black 
 John, who had gained a name on the plains of Pales- 
 tine ; and near to him were Hugh the Dauntless, 
 and Robert the Bold, who had shed their blood — 
 the former at Cressy and the latter at Agincourt. 
 From the opposite side of the room, looked down 
 the Marchionesses, whose strange, antique attire, 
 told that many generations had passed away since 
 they had graced with their presence the castle hall. 
 
90 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 The carved panel-work, the rich tapestry, the color- 
 ed ceiling, and the dark floor, all spoke of the fash- 
 ion of a former day — a fashion in which the Jast 
 century had made no change. 
 
 In one corner of the room stood a huge, bier-like 
 bed. From its four posts rose a canopy so lofty 
 that it touched the ceiling ; and from the sides of 
 the canopy hung black curtains of silken velvet, 
 elaborately embroidered, and so long that they swept 
 the floor. On the bed lay a man whose furrowed 
 brow, silver hair, and flowing beard, gave token 
 that he had seen many years. His wasted and bend • 
 ed form was wrapped in a robe of crimson silk. 
 On his head he wore a crimson turban ; and around 
 his brow was bound a black fillet, on which were 
 oriental characters wrought in gold. His face was 
 deadly pale ; and his quivering lip and faint breath- 
 ing told that he was approaching the close of life. 
 His features were singular, and had been beautiful ; 
 and his eye, though sunken, still beamed with the 
 vivacity and brilliancy of youth. At the foot of the 
 bed wei;«gathered his favorite domestics ; while the 
 hoary butler, bearing at his girdle the keys of office, 
 knelt by the side, and proffered a goblet of wine to 
 his dying lord. 
 
 In the recess of one of the high and narrow win- 
 dows, that looked out upon the park and the circu- 
 lar road that wound through it to the castle, stood 
 an attendant, apparently watching the approach of 
 some expected friend. As the bell of the castle 
 rung the hour of twelve, the Marquis spoke, — 
 and his voice, though low and tremulous, had a 
 musical softness in its tone : 
 
CLARENCE DE COUCY. 
 
 91 
 
 " What can delay Clarence ? My messenger 
 could not have reached him, or he would be here. 
 My word, like the prayer of the holy man, would 
 have broken the spell of the sorceress. He would 
 have left the Venetian maid, fair and fascinating as 
 she is, even were he standing with her at the altar, 
 had my summons reached him there. He is too 
 true a De Coucy not to know the influence my 
 dying blessing or dying ban would have upon his 
 future happiness." 
 
 "He is coming!" shouted the watcher; "-I see 
 his form distinctly in the moonlight, and he is riding 
 rapidly toward the castle." 
 
 In a few moments, the drawbridge fell heavily 
 across the moat— the bolts rattled in their wards — 
 the castle gates creaked on their rusty hinges— and 
 the hoofs of the rider's steed rang on the pavement 
 of the court. In a moment more, a light, quick step, 
 was heard crossing the hall and ascending the stairs. 
 The door opened, and in rushed the expected Cla- 
 rence. He was a tall, finely proportioned man, with 
 the same black piercing eye that distinguished the 
 elder De Coucy. Judging from his countenance, he 
 might have seen five-and- twenty summers. Throw- 
 ing from him his heavy riding cloak and plumed 
 cap, he hastened to the embrace of his father, and 
 inquired in tones of the fondest affection of his 
 welfare. 
 
 The Marquis gave a signal to his attendants, who 
 withdrew, and the father and son were alone. Slow- 
 ly the dying man raised himself in his bed, and then 
 gazed long and steadfastly upon the face of his son 
 before he spoke : 
 
92 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 " Yes, thou hast the faultless form, the broad and 
 nohle brow, the chiseled lip and the auburn locks of 
 thy mother ; but thine eye is the eye of a De Coucy." 
 And for a few moments he again gazed in silence 
 upon the youth. 
 
 " My days are numbered, Clarence. The grim 
 messenger has come to bid me leave the earth, on 
 which I have looked and trod for fourscore years, 
 and go to that land, our only knowledge of which 
 we gain from the philosopher's theory and the poet's 
 dream. I welcome the grave, with its solemn still- 
 ness and unbroken quiet, where I can repose after 
 my long, unvaried, and weary pilgrimage. You, 
 Clarence, are young, and happy, and buoyant with 
 hope ; and in advancing along the path of life, you 
 look upon the bright surface of the flowers that 
 spring up before you, and mark not the deadly 
 serpent that lurks at their roots. But a few years, 
 and the treachery of friendship, the sting of ingrati- 
 tude, and the faithlessness of love, will teach you 
 the heartlessness and sordid selfishness of the world. 
 I dread not the change I am about to undergo, for 
 I have nought of happiness to lose. Sickly and de- 
 formed, I have been for years the sport and mock- 
 ery of men. Life, therefore, instead of being a 
 source of happiness, has become to me a curse. I 
 withdrew myself at an early age, from the scrutiny 
 and sneer of men, and passed the long day and the 
 silent night at the fire of the laboratory or over the 
 writings of the sage. I wasted the vigor of life in 
 vain and unprofitable study — in striving to pene- 
 trate the secrets of nature, and to learn the myste- 
 ries of the occult sciences. I inquired with the as- 
 
CLARENCE DE COUCY. 93 
 
 trologer what caused the mysterious movement of 
 the sun, moon, and stars; and sought to learn their 
 hidden influence over the destinies of men. 1 
 watched with the naturalist the budding, the growth, 
 and the decay of the plant. Though unconnected 
 with men in action, I was linked to them in thought. 
 From history I endeavored to obtain a knowledge 
 of their characters, and to learn the hidden motives 
 that influenced their conduct. I have even strove 
 to gain from Death its secret ; and watched by the 
 bedside of the dying when they writhed in agony 
 beneath the grasp of an unseen power — when the 
 blood curdled in the vein, and the death-chill crept 
 upward from the icy limbs to the breast, where the 
 heart beat fainter and fainter, and the eye became 
 clouded and glazed, and the mind reeled from its 
 throne. But I learned nothing: 'They died and 
 left no sign.' And bitter experience has taught me, 
 like Faustus, to find nothing in the little knowledge 
 I possess but its inutility. But you, my child, are 
 young, and comely, and vigorous. The lettered 
 scroll and the crucible are not for you. The sword 
 must carve out a high career for you among your 
 fellow men. I have much to say to you, Clarence, 
 and but a brief time to say it in. Report has reach- 
 ed me that you are betrothed to a woman of obscure 
 birth at Venice. Is it true T' 
 " I am, indeed, father ; and Agnes is beautiful" — 
 " Beautiful ! but would you disgrace the name 
 which you have received unspotted and unstained 
 through a long line of noble and gallant ancestors 1 
 The brave knights and haughty dames that sur- 
 
94 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 round 3-011 would start from their frames, were you 
 to bring into these halls a plebian stranger." 
 
 " But I have plighted my faith to her. I have 
 sworn" — 
 
 " What care I for 3'our silly oaths 1 Better be 
 broken than that, by so shameful an alliance, you 
 should contaminate the blood of the De Couc3 r s. 
 Better that you should descend childless to the 
 grave, and be buried in your armor and with your 
 sword, tin' last of your line. But I have selected 
 you a bride becoming your rank — one of a race as 
 ancient and noble as your own. Anna St. Clair 
 you must wed" — 
 
 " But Agnes, father"— 
 
 "You will wed her, for she is beautiful— her e3 r e 
 is more piercing than the falcon's — her hair is glos- 
 sier than the raven's wing — her step more stately 
 than the antelope's" — 
 
 " But Agnes, father" — 
 
 " Her kindred — her jewels and her gold — her 
 broad domains — shall gain rank, and power, and 
 wealth for you" — 
 
 "But Agnes, father !" 
 
 "Would you have me rest quiet in my grave? 
 Are you proud of your ancestral honors 1 Do you 
 value my blessing ?" 
 
 " I do— I do ; but must I leave"— 
 
 " Yes, for ever leave her and forget her, as she 
 has already doubtless forgotten you. Like her na- 
 tion, she is as fickle as the changing wind. Her 
 vows were made but to be broken. Swear to me 
 now that you will wed Anna St. Clair: if you love 
 me, swear!" 
 
CLARENCE DE COUCY. 95 
 
 On his knees, by the bedside, the youth swore to 
 obey his wishes, and called Heaven to witness the 
 sincerity of his oath. The dying father raised his 
 withered and trembling hands, and, in the language 
 of the strongest affection, blessed his child. He 
 strove to say something more, but his voice became 
 choked and inaudible, and he sank back upon his 
 pillow. Clarence called in the ancient butler, and 
 they endeavored to resuscitate him, but in vain. 
 The dull film gathered on his eye, and the last cold- 
 ness upon his limbs, and in a few moments he ceas- 
 ed to breathe. 
 
 Although the Marquis De Coucy had gained, by 
 his retired life, his peculiar studies, and his eccen- 
 tricities, the reputation of being on rather too inti- 
 mate terms with a nameless, black-coated gentle- 
 man, to be a good Christian ; yet money easily ob- 
 tained (and what will it not 1) the prayers and in- 
 tercessions of the church. He was laid in state in 
 his castle hall, and the consecrated tapers were 
 placed at his head and at his feet. He was buried 
 in consecrated ground, and with Christian rites. 
 The holy water was sprinkled on him — the holy 
 psalm sung over him — the holy prayer said at his 
 grave — and the bell of the neighboring monastery 
 tolled his knell. 
 
 I will now wield the story-teller's wand, and con- 
 jure a different scene before the kind reader who 
 has vouchsafed to peruse my tale : 
 
 It was the close of one of those delightful days of 
 summer, so peculiar to the ' garden of Europe' — 
 bright Italy. The daylight was fast fading away, — 
 
96 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 and the moon, full-orbed and ' beaming silver 
 bright,' shed its rich and softening beams on the 
 lofty palaces of Venice and the dark blue waves of 
 the Adriatic. The song of the gondolier, the peal 
 of music, and the hum of the dense and restless 
 multitude that thronged the streets, rose often upon 
 the still and balmy air. In a retired section of the 
 city, where were situated the residences of the less 
 wealthy part of the populace, dwelt Alberto Coren- 
 ni, a respectable merchant. Picture to yourself a 
 small chamber in the back part of his dwelling. 
 The walls were decorated with several sketches 
 whose delicacy of outline and coloring told that 
 they were the work of a female hand. In one 
 corner of the room stood a harp, which bore evi- 
 dence to the musical talent possessed by the inhab- 
 itant. On a small circular table that graced the 
 centre of the room, were several vases of rare flow- 
 ers, whose bright hues and fragrant odors amply 
 repaid the time and care required for their cultiva- 
 tion. The window, which reached the ground, 
 opened into a verandah, around the slender pillars 
 of which clung the fragrant honey-suckle and clus- 
 tering jessamine. Beyond was a small garden, filled 
 with flowering plants and blossoming shrubs, redo- 
 lent of perfume ; and in its centre was a circular 
 grass plat, green enough to woo the nightly dances 
 of Titania and the fairies. 
 
 On a sofa, placed near one of the windows, sat a 
 young and exquisitely beautiful female. Her cheek, 
 in which the lily and the rose were blended, rested 
 on her hand as she gazed out into the garden. Her 
 dark and glossy hair hung in curling ringlets down 
 
CLARENCE DE COUCY. 97 
 
 a neck whiter than ivory. Her dress was of that 
 light and airy fashion worn by the Venetian ladies 
 at that period. Her foot, which pressed a cushion- 
 ed stool, was cased in a slipper so exceedingly small 
 that it might have pinched the toes of Cinderella 
 herself. Her zneditations (young ladies at times do 
 meditate,) were broken by a quick step along the 
 passage that led to her apartment, and by the en- 
 trance of a young man, whose knightly dress and 
 lofty bearing told that he was of patrician rank. 
 His figure was tall and elegantly proportioned ; his 
 features were regular and intellectual ; and his eye 
 was particularly striking, it was so large, and black, 
 and piercing. He seated himself by the fair Vene 
 tian, and, grasping her hand, he gazed for some 
 moments, ere he spoke, upon her rare and dream- 
 like beauty. 
 
 " I have come, dear Agnes, to tell you that neces- 
 sity compels me to leave you for a time. A mes- 
 senger has arrived from my father, summoning me 
 home. Disease has wasted his strength — years press 
 heavily upon him — and he feels as if his stay on 
 earth was short." 
 
 " You are going to leave me, Clarence ?" 
 
 " But for a few months, dearest ! That duty 
 which I owe, and that love which I bear to my 
 father, bid me hasten to him. And I have been 
 long, very long from home, too. Worlds would 
 not tempt me to be away from him in his last hours. 
 There is a dark prophecy about the De Coucy that 
 receives not the dying blessing of his father." 
 
 "I shall never see you again !" 
 
 « Agnes ! Agnes ! think not so." 
 
98 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 "Your kindred and friends will oppose your 
 union with me— poor and unknown as I am." 
 
 " What care 1 for friends and kinsmen ? What 
 care I, think yon, for rank and gold '.'" 
 
 " You will see many of the high-born dames of 
 your native land, and you yourself will forget me." 
 
 "Never! never! your suspicious are cruel — are 
 unjust." 
 
 " I had a dream last night, De Couey— a wild, 
 strange dream. I thought I was in your own sunny 
 France, — and before me rose your own dark castle, 
 such as you have described it to me, with its lofty 
 battlements, its moat and massive walls. And as I 
 looked, the gates opened, and the drawbridge fell ; 
 and a gay cavalcade of knights and ladies rode out. 
 And you were one, — and by your side, mounted on 
 a milk-white palfrey, was a lady dressed in her bri- 
 dal robes. And your retainers followed in their 
 gala dresses. And I heard the bells of the old mon- 
 astery, you have so often mentioned, ring out. merry 
 peals. The scene changed : You stood by an altar 
 in a chapel ; the lady in the bridal dress stood there 
 too ; and the aged priest raised his hands to bless 
 you. I stepped in between you and your bride ; I 
 heard a shriek, and then all was confused and indis- 
 tinct. The scene changed again : I stood, as before, 
 near your castle walls,— and another procession 
 came out from the gates ; not a pageant, as before, 
 but a sad and solemn train. There came a hearse, 
 with its dark pall and black plumes; and your 
 retainers followed, two and two, in mourning, and 
 with downcast looks ; and they wound their way 
 to the tomb of your ancestors; and ere they had 
 
CLARENCE DE COUCY. 99 
 
 lowered the coffin into the damp vault, I approach- 
 ed, and looked, and— it was yours ! Then I shrieked, 
 and woke." 
 
 " Trust me, Agnes, on the honor of a knight : ay, 
 I will bind myself by an oath, too, dark and solemn 
 as your dream. Bring me a lance, and a cup of 
 wine." 
 
 The lovers wounded themselves in the left arm, 
 and mingled their blood in the sparkling liquor. 
 Kneeling before her, with his hand on a crucifix, 
 Clarence swore to be hers— to be hers only, and for- 
 ever; and if he violated his oath, he prayed that he 
 might be accursed— that infamy might blacken his 
 name, and tha; he, stripped of his honors and his 
 wealth,migln descend childless to the grave: then lift- 
 ed and drained the cup. Rising from his keeling pos- 
 ture, De Coucy approached his betrothed. He threw 
 his arms around her, and drew her trembling and 
 shrinking form nearer and nearer to his breast. He 
 imprinted a long and burning kiss upon her coral 
 lips, and then rushed from the room. 
 
 Agnes remained for a moment fixed and motion- 
 less as a statue. As the fall of her lover's footsteps 
 grew fainter and fainter, the deadening sense of 
 drear and utter loneliness came over her, and she 
 sank upon the sofa and wept. 
 
 The retainers of the old Marquis De Coucy 
 mourned his death for three whole weeks, — and, 
 like dutiful vassals, attempted to drown their grief 
 in bumpers of Burgundy. At the end of that peri- 
 od, the butler closed the doors of the wine-vaults, 
 
100 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 and thus put a stop to this singular as well as some- 
 what expensive mode of lamentation. 
 
 The aged crones in the neighborhood, who had 
 not reaped the " benefit of his dying," coupled the 
 name of the late Marquis with wizzard and necro- 
 mancer. Had they been permitted to get drunk on 
 Clarence's liquors, they would doubtless have ex- 
 tolled his father as a pattern of godliness and the 
 personification of every virtue ; for wine is said to 
 have a wonderful effect in softening the heart, and 
 rendering even ancient ladies both amiable and 
 charitable. Often in the long winter evenings, 
 when the peasants were gathered around their cot- 
 tage fires, and the chill wind howled desolately 
 through the adjoining forest trees, these weird 
 dames would tell wild tales of strange lights that 
 gleamed at midnight from the dead man's room, and 
 ugly forms that held their orgies at his grave. But 
 the monks, who had said prayers for his soul, de- 
 clared that the old Marquis slept quietly in his coffin, 
 and that the moon shone as brightly on his marble 
 slab as if there reposed beneath it a holy friar or a 
 sinless saint. 
 
 Clarence mourned long and deeply for his father; 
 but time gradually healed his wounded spirit. His 
 " inconsolable grief" first changed to a deep melan- 
 choly, then to a sober sadness, and at last settled 
 down into an affectionate remembrance. Hi8 
 thoughts at first turned often on Agnes, and her 
 image rose up before him in his dreams. But he 
 remembered the last words of his father, and strove 
 to forget her. Time hung heavy on his hands. 
 He had wandered, till weary, through the long cor- 
 
CLARENCE DE COUCY. 101 
 
 ridors and echoing halls of his castle. The uncouth 
 pictures of his ancestors, and the strange garniture 
 of the rooms, and the mystic instruments and letter- 
 ed parchments of his father, soon lost that charm of 
 novelty which a long residence from home had at 
 first attached to them. He had rode, and hunted, 
 and fished, until riding, and hunting and fishing, 
 became stale. As a last resource against ennui, he 
 determined upon visiting Anna St. Clair. 
 
 " Women are fickle." So are men. And Clarence 
 De Coucy, who but six months before had so solemn- 
 ly sworn to love and cherish Agnes Corennie, and 
 then fancied that he could hardly separate himself 
 from her to close the eyes of his dying sire, now 
 remembered her only as a beautiful vision that had 
 appeared to make glad one portion of his path 
 through life. He showed but little knowledge of 
 Woman, when he thought that her love for him wa9 
 a feeling of the hour. When the report of his being 
 betrothed to a lady in France reached her ear, and 
 the rumor became confirmed by his unbroken si- 
 lence, the intense love which had so long held pos- 
 session of her heart, gave place to a feeling of re- 
 venge—burning, deep-rooted, and implacable. 
 
 •• This is rather a strange way, to pledge oneself 
 to marry a lady whom one never saw, and may not 
 fancy," said the Marquis to himself, as he rode 
 leisurely along towards the chateau of St. Clair. 
 " It takes two also to make a bargain, and how do 
 I know but she may dislike me 1 Then she may be 
 a perfect Witch of Endor in person — hump-backed 
 —lame — cross-eyed— and what is worse, cross-tem- 
 
102 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 pered. I had as lief marry the Devil as a cross 
 woman. If [ recollect, rightly, however, my father 
 said she was beautiful : so are leopards beautiful, 
 but they bite and tear. I wish I were informed about 
 her disposition. And Agnes too" — and the young 
 Marquis drew a deep sigh, for he had not forgotten 
 the surpassing loveliness of her person, and the 
 sweetness of her temper. 
 
 The building soon appeared in sight, with its ex- 
 tensive lawn and broad pleasure grounds, that spoke 
 loudly of the luxurious tasle and ample wealth of 
 the owner. Riding up Ihe long gravel-walk, shaded 
 wiih giant elms, he reached and alighted at the 
 steps. One of the servants in attendance took the 
 bridle of his horse, while another waited upon him 
 to the hall, where he was met and welcomed by the 
 owner. In a moment more he was ushered into ihe 
 drawing-room and presented to the Marchioness and 
 her daughter. 
 
 "Heavens ! what an angel !" mentally ejacula- 
 ted Clarence, as he gazed upon the latter. Anna 
 St. Clair was strikingly bcauliful. Her form was 
 exquisitely moulded, and of fairy lightness. Her 
 hair was auburn ; and as aba sat near the wiudow, 
 the bright sunlight fell upon it, and every curl 
 seemed edged with gold. Her eyes were large, soft, 
 and hazel: and the effect upon De Coucy in one 
 short hour must have been potent, for ere that time 
 had elapsed, he had made certain comparisons be- 
 tween her and .Agnes, which ihe latter would have 
 resented as rather disparaging. When he rose to 
 leave, the Marquis St. Clair reproached him gently 
 for having passed so long a time in the vicinity 
 
CLARENCE DE COUCY. 103 
 
 without crossing his threshold; and the eye of 
 Anna spoke so plainly " do come again,"" 1 that he 
 promised to visit them often in future— a promise, 
 by the by, which he most religiously kepi. 
 
 It is an old and frue saying, that " love-making is 
 a thing to hear and not to tell." We will therefore 
 not dwell ou the courtship, but hasten to the de- 
 nouement. The preliminaries had been settled ia 
 due form, and the day for the wedding was at hand. 
 A brilliant parly had assembled on the evening pre- 
 vious, at the chateau of the bride's father. The 
 halls of the building rung with the loud laugh, the 
 gay song, and the notes of merry music ; and the 
 oaken floors shook beneath the feet of the dancers. 
 The dresses of the ladies were magnificent, and so 
 covered with diamonds that the light of the waxen 
 tapers were reflected a thousand fold. When the 
 hour for supper had arrived, the young Marquis 
 with his youlhful bride led the way to the banquet 
 hall. The guests had scarcely seated themselves, 
 and the covers of the dishes been removed, when 
 the door opened, and a youthful Knight entered the 
 room. The drops of dew, which sparkled on the 
 edges of the snow-white plumes that waved in his 
 riding cap and dimmed the golden clasp of his scar- 
 let mantle, showed that he had passed the evening 
 under the open skies. His face was concealed be- 
 neaih a mask, but his form bore evidence to his 
 youth. He appeared to be a stranger to all present. 
 The old Marquis supposed it must be an emissary 
 from Court, come to vvaich the words of the guests. 
 Clarence conjectured that it was some intimate 
 friend of his own, who, having come suddenly into 
 
104 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 the neighborhood, had, for a jest, resolved to make 
 one at the wedding, without being known. The 
 stranger immediately seated himself at the table 
 directly opposite the groom and bride, and kept his 
 eyes fixed constantly upon them. To the surprise 
 of those in the vicinity, he neither tasted of food or 
 wine. His presence and strange conduct drew the 
 attention of all, and soon dampened the spirit of 
 conviviality that had previously reigned. The 
 guests retired at an early hour, and last of all went 
 the masked Knight, who, mounting a fleet horse, 
 rode rapidly away. 
 
 The morning broke auspiciously for the bridal. 
 Not a cloud hung in the broad blue sky. At an 
 early hour the gay pageant issued from the gates of 
 De Coucy Castle, and the old drawbridge shook 
 beneath the trampling of the horses. There were 
 gallant knights in gilded armor, and gay ladies 
 sparkling in jewels. And then came the bride on a 
 milk white palfrey ; and by her side rode the happy 
 Clarence ; and his retainers followed in an almost 
 endless train. The bells of the monastery chimed 
 merrily, and the brazen horns rung loud and clear. 
 As they gained the road that led to the church, the 
 stranger guest, who had interrupted the banquet of 
 the previous evening, again made his appearance, 
 riding along on his coal-black steed, and his white 
 plumes waving in the morning breeze. Onward he 
 came, and dashing by the cavalcade, he alighted at 
 the chapel door and walked up the head of the aisle. 
 The bridal party soon arrived. 
 
 The Marquis De Coucy and his lovely bride stood 
 by the altar, and their friends were gathered around 
 
CLARENCE DE COUCY. 105 
 
 and the aged priest was there to perform the cere- 
 mony. The services commenced, and the priest 
 asked the Marquis St. Clair if he consented to the 
 union ? Ere he could reply, the stranger spoke 
 aloud " I do not" — and stepping rapidly through 
 the crowd, he placed himself between Clarence and 
 his bride. 
 
 " Who and what are you," demanded De Coucy, 
 " that dares thus to intrude here ?" 
 
 Throwing aside his cap and tearing off his mask, 
 the Knight exhibited the beautiful features of Agnes 
 Corennie. Her long black hair was thrown back 
 from her marble brow, and her dark speaking eye 
 gleamed with an expression of the fiercest malignity. 
 
 " You know her now. And do you remember 
 my dream, Clarence ? It was a dark and fearful 
 one, but strictly shall it be fulfilled." 
 
 Approaching nearer and nearer to the trembling 
 groom, she suddenly drew a dagger from beneath 
 her riding dress and stabbed him to the heart. Ere 
 her arm could be arrested, she had drawn the 
 weapon from the wound and sheathing it in her 
 breast, fell a corpse. 
 
 " Raise me, that I may once more see the golden 
 sun, and look again upon the green earth." 
 
 The attendants slowly raised the emaciated form 
 of Anna St. Clair, and placed her by the open win- 
 dow. Her eye had lost its youthful brilliancy, and 
 her cheek was pale and sunken. * * * * In 
 a little week, and the grave closed over the virgin 
 bride. 
 
106 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Beneath the ancient oak, that stood in a retired 
 corner of the village burial place, slept the Vene- 
 tian maid. 
 
 And they shrouded the corse of Clarence De 
 Coucy in his knighlly armor, and palled his coffin 
 with his ancestral banner ; and with the solemn 
 rites and imposing ceremony of the Roman Church, 
 they laid him in the vault of his lofty line— the last 
 of his race and name. 
 
THE LOVERS. 107 
 
 THE LOVERS. 
 
 BY MRS. L. H. SIGOURNEY. 
 
 The watch-liglit of the lovers stream'd 
 Forth from their lattice high, 
 As lost in deep discourse they sate, 
 While summer-winds went by ; 
 The ban-dog howl'd, the clouds did lower, 
 
 Winds shook the willow's stem, 
 The clock toll'd out the midnight hour — 
 What were such sounds to them 1 
 
 Oh, steal not on their tranced speech, 
 Of smile and murmur'd sigh ; 
 Shake not the dew-drop from the rose, 
 Dim not the opal's die ; 
 For life hath many a path of thorn 
 
 To wound the feet that rove, 
 But yet ! no sunnier spot than this— 
 Break not the trance of love. 
 
108 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 SONG OF THE SYBIL. 
 
 BY C. W. EVEREST. 
 
 In olden time, when Greece had lost her sway, 
 And Rome was peerless mistress of the world — 
 In a lone spot, in fair Italia's clime, 
 Upon a beetling cliff's projecting point, 
 That high o'erhung a slumbering vale beneath, 
 A Sybil sat ! Wan grief had marked her brow, 
 And Care had left his lengthened furrows deep ; 
 Disheveled was her hair, and her light robe, 
 In careless fold, her shrinking form concealed ; 
 Her eye was restless, and her wasted hand 
 Swept wildly o'er a lyre, beside her placed, 
 And thus she sung : 
 
 1 Life! 'tis a cheat! 
 For fair is the light of its morning skies, 
 And bright are the hues of his varying dyes ; 
 
 But its splendor is fleet; 
 And the promising glory too speedily flies — 
 
 Life ! 'tis a cheat ! 
 
 1 Hope ! thou art vain ! 
 For fond is thy promise in young life's hour, 
 And joyous thy song in its sun lit bower ; 
 
 But sorrow and pain 
 Soon sway the lorn heart with resistless power — 
 
 Hope ! thou art vain ! 
 
SONG OF THE SYBIL. 109 
 
 ' Love ! what art thou ? 
 Though ardent awhile thy consuming flame, 
 And thy maddening frenzy none can tame — 
 
 Yet the altered brow, 
 And the eye, and the mien, do all proclaim, 
 
 Love ! what art thou ! 
 
 1 Friendship deceives ! 
 For sweet is its flattering vow of esteem, 
 To the youthful heart, as the joys of a dream ; 
 
 And while it believes, 
 And the promising pleasures realities seem, 
 
 Friendship deceives ! 
 
 ' Death ! thou art blest ! 
 For thou freest the soul from its shackles of blight, 
 And the shades of the good, clad in garments of light, 
 
 Do joyfully rest, 
 Or rove the elysian fields of delight — 
 
 Death ! thou art blest !' 
 
110 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 STANZAS. 
 
 Come, my people, enter ihou into thy chambers." Isa 
 
 Where am those chambers of their rest ? 
 
 Oh, Seer! why didst thou not unfold? 
 And why to thy prophetic breast 
 
 Was not this yearning secret told ? 
 
 To what lone spot do we repair, 
 In earth beneath, or heaven afar, — 
 
 And what pursuits employ us there, 
 While waiting for the judgment bar ? 
 
 Say, does the shivering spirit haste, 
 Leaving its lone, forgotten clay, 
 
 To seek amid the starry waste 
 Some bright oasis for its stay ? 
 
 Crows greener there the sylvan bower, 
 Than what we leave behind on earth'? 
 
 Smiles sweeter there the rosy flower — 
 No winds to blight its tender birth ? 
 
 Doth brighter gold or deeper blue 
 Invest that pale and cloudless sky ? 
 
 Their glassy waves more lovely too 
 Than those now sparkling in mine eye ? 
 
STANZAS. Ill 
 
 And, wandering through the twilight glens, 
 
 Doth love again its idol know — 
 And purer ties unile the friends 
 
 That walked in fellowship below 1 
 
 What minstrels, from the courts of day, 
 To that abode eh'all bring their lyres, 
 
 And soothe our boding fears away, 
 With music from their golden wires 1 
 
 Do rays from off the distant Throne 
 
 Light up the amethystine air — 
 And glimpses of the City, shown, 
 
 Beguile our weary waiting there 7 
 
 Do ever roaming winds betray 
 
 Where Vengeance holds her foes entombed 1 
 And clouds rise dun upon the day 
 
 From out the chasms of the doomed 7 
 
 "Where those parted spirits slumber, 
 
 Restless mortal, ask no more ; 
 For soon thy shade shall join their number, 
 
 Tenant of that dusky shore I" 
 
 Ex R, 
 
112 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 DAY DREAMING. 
 
 BY MARY ANN DODD. 
 
 How do the memories we love, 
 
 Come like a fairy spell, 
 When far away— the banished heart 
 
 Will on home-tokens dwell. 
 
 One smooth, bright curl of auburn hair, 
 
 Doth round my finger twine, 
 And then I see the fair brow, where 
 
 Its sister tresses shine. 
 
 I muse— and in my waking dream, 
 
 Swiftly sweet visions come ; 
 And fancy leads me gently back 
 
 To thee, mine own green home. 
 
 The summer rose is blooming now, 
 
 Throwing its fragrance wide ; 
 Again I breathe the mountain air, 
 
 And Thou art by my side: 
 
 Thou ! whose dear presence from my thoughts 
 
 Can every care beguile, 
 With thy sweet words of innocence 
 
 And ever sunny smile. 
 
 Once more those blue, mirth-loving eyes, 
 
 Upon my pathway shine, 
 And as I view each well-known spot, 
 
 Thy bright glance follows mine. 
 
DAY DREAMING. 113 
 
 We stray in quiet converse, where 
 
 The sun-lit waters glance, 
 Or read beneath the elm tree's shade 
 
 Some tale of old romance. 
 
 I see thy heart's deep tenderness 
 
 Told in its mirror fair, 
 As every thought the poet loves, 
 
 Finds its own echo there. 
 
 And when the twilight shadows fall 
 
 Forbidding far to roam, 
 That voice of wave-like melody 
 
 Is singing " home ! sweet home I" 
 
 'Tis gone !— and I am left alone- 
 Faded the vision fair ! 
 
 My clasping fingers only hold 
 The lock of satin hair. 
 
 While others doat on gems of price, 
 
 One" treasured tress is mine ; 
 And many a dear day-dream I owe 
 
 To this bright curl of thine. 
 
114 THE MOSS ROSE- 
 
 A CHILD AT PRAYER. 
 
 BY REV. R. TURNBUIX. 
 
 Behold a scene of love, 
 
 And holiness sublime, 
 To lift the soul above 
 
 This narrow earthly clime ; 
 A lovely, little child at prayer, 
 
 Her parents standing by, 
 Gazing upon their infant fair 
 
 With deep delighted eye : 
 A holy halo fills the place, 
 A light divine, a heavenly grace ! 
 
 Her face's radiant glow, 
 
 Her dark and pensive eye, 
 Her alabaster brow, 
 
 On which dark ringlets lie, 
 Her little hands upturned to heaven, 
 
 Her body gently bent ;— 
 All mingling, like the hues of even 
 
 With mellow sunbeams blent, — 
 Give to the scene a magic glow 
 Which none but happy spirits know. 
 
 This is a sight to wake 
 Of past delight the dreams, 
 
 Like music on the lake, 
 Or dying sunny gleams ; 
 
A CHILD AT PRAYER. 115 
 
 To raise the sigh for heauty flown 
 
 Which time can ne'er restore, 
 To draw the tear for gladness gone 
 For music heard no more ; 
 And conjure up a vision grand 
 Of beautiful, but vanished land ! 
 
 This, too, should rouse our faith, 
 
 And bear the soul away, 
 Above the shadowy earth 
 
 To climes of cloudless day ; 
 For this is heaven begun in time, 
 
 A prelude of that bliss, 
 Which matchless, endless, and sublime, 
 
 No tongue can e'er express, — 
 A glory from the world above, 
 A sunbeam of eternal love ! 
 
 O, well may angels gaze, 
 
 Upon the lovely sight, 
 And well to heaven may raise 
 
 The song of deep delight ; 
 For richer incense never rose 
 
 From Eastern shrines to God, 
 And lovelier scene did ne'er repose 
 
 In Judah's bright abode : 
 O 'tis a gleam of glory given 
 To point the raptured soul to Heaven ! 
 
116 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 MARY STUART. 
 
 THE DAY BEFORE HER EXECUTION. 
 BY G. M. SNOW. 
 
 No jewelled diadem is gleaming 
 
 On my regal brow ; 
 Yet my air of queenly seeming, 
 
 I wear it even now. 
 With prison walls ye may enclose 
 
 This body— but my soul, 
 The proud free soul, my Maker gave, 
 
 Ye never can control. 
 
 The mandate for my death ye bear ; 
 
 Joy fills this widowed breast ; 
 My life I would not that ye spare— 
 
 I long to be at rest : 
 For prisoned years, Life's clouded morn, 
 
 And blasted hopes have been 
 To me your sovereign's richest boon, 
 
 The queendom of a Queen. 
 
 Oh ! pleasant France ! thy glad streams saw 
 
 The joyous lapse of years, 
 When thy fond heart, love's impress bore, 
 
 Nor knew nor grief, nor tears : 
 Those arrowy streams, their depths of blue, 
 
 In music still glide on, 
 But those bright, happy years I knew, 
 
 Those blissful years are gone. 
 
MARY STUART. 117 
 
 My soul with treachery ne'er had part, 
 
 Thou know'st, Great Teacher, Thou ! 
 That what is written in my heart, 
 
 Is written on my brow. 
 False tongues have wrought this deed of death ; 
 
 A mighty nation's name 
 Is sullied by the withering breath, 
 
 The Siroc breath of shame. 
 
 Weep not my Marys !* death to me 
 
 Comes like a dream of home ; 
 From a weary life it sets me free, 
 
 With the angel throng to roam. 
 Take all the Stuart has to give, 
 
 Her love, her latest sigh ; 
 Ye have seen in me how a Queen should live, 
 
 Ye shall see how a Queen should die. 
 
 Mary had four favorite niaids of honor named Mary. 
 
118 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 THE SEASONS. 
 
 BY C. W. EVEREST. 
 
 Behold, fond maul 
 
 See here thy pictured life: pass some few years, 
 
 Thy fiow'ring Spring, thy Summer's ardent strength, 
 
 Thy sober Autumn fading into age, 
 
 And pale concluding Winter comes at last, 
 
 And shuts the scene." [Thomson. 
 
 The Seasons present to tbe contemplative lover 
 of nature scenes of no ordinary interest. Who can 
 behold their beauty and order unmoved 1 Who can 
 pass by the wonderful organization and surprising 
 harmony of the brief period which we term a year, 
 without experiencing the deepest emotions of admi- 
 ration, and at times blended with a strange and not 
 unwelcome feeling of sadness 1 
 
 Much has been said and sung upon this most 
 sublime theme, but it has lost none of its interest. 
 The Seasons still roll their silent round, as pleas- 
 ing, as sad, and as harmonious as ever. They have 
 continued on in their unbroken order, since the 
 time when " the morning stars sang together" at Cre- 
 ation's birth, and will move on in the same silent 
 grandeur until " the Heavens shall be rolled togeth- 
 er as a scroll, and the elements melt with fervent 
 heat." But the Seasons present no stronger claim 
 to the attention of man, than from the affinity they 
 bear to his own strange and evanescent existence. 
 Emphatically may they be termed a faithful em- 
 blem of the human life. 
 
 Like the fleeting year, Life hath Its Spring-time. 
 The young heart of the pilgrim bounds with joy, and 
 
THE SEASONS. 119 
 
 dilates with blissful anticipations. His bosom glows 
 with warm emotions, and the " streamlet of his af- 
 fections" gushes forth, unimpeded by the barriers of 
 dissimulation or distrust. Knowing no guile, he 
 looks for none in others, but esteems all mankind as 
 the happy brethren of one harmonious family. He 
 listens with credulity to the soft whispers of hope, 
 and trusts that all which promises will as faithfully 
 perform. Life appears to him " a glorious garden, — 
 above all sunshine, and beneath all flowers." But 
 the golden hours of childhood and youth roll swiftly 
 away, and bring him to the meridian of manhood — 
 the Summer of life. 
 
 Manhood opens before him new scenes and situa- 
 tions. Cares, and the business of the world, gather 
 around him, and the pursuit of pleasure yields for 
 awhile to the severer duties of life. Still he hopes ; 
 and from the turmoil of perplexities and anxieties, 
 he forms golden plans of future enjoyment, and 
 looks forward with fond anticipation to the evening 
 of life, when the troubles of the world will no longer 
 agitate his quiet repose. But the vigor of manhood 
 passes, and the Autumn of life gathers around him. 
 
 He now turns a retrospective glance over the bu- 
 ried years of his existence, and they appear like the 
 mists of the morning. How have the bright dreams 
 of his fancy been realized 1 Where are those enjoy- 
 ments which his youth-time and his early manhood 
 painted "? the clear skies and the calm sunshine of 
 hope 1 Ah ! the world has proved to him but too 
 truly " a fleeting show." The sunlight of hope has 
 vanished before the dark storms of reality. He has 
 seized with eager grasp the extended hand of friend- 
 
120 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 ship, but it has sent back an icy chill to his heart. 
 He has knelt at the smiling rill of pleasure, but it 
 has receded from his lip. He has grasped the bauble 
 of wealth, but it proved a hollow treasure. He has 
 grasped at every rose-bud of earthly bliss, and a 
 thorn from each has stung him : — and his drooping 
 heart is covered with the withered foliage of his 
 brightest hopes. Soon his gloomy Autumn passes, 
 and old age— the cheerless Winter of life— closes 
 o'er him. 
 
 Dark is now his existence. Storms encompass 
 him. The fountain of his affections is congealed. 
 Life becomes a dreary burden to itself, and his cold 
 heart yearns for its colder resting-place. For a while 
 the flame trembles in its socket, and then goes out 
 in darkness. 
 
 Thus have we contemplated the Seasons, and thus 
 the affinity they bear to the life of man. And do 
 they teach no lesson 1 Indeed, every tiling in nature 
 is rife with a moral. The little rill, as it pursues its 
 silent course to the ocean, may admonish us that 
 life is thus passing on, silently and imperceptibly, to 
 the great ocean of eternity. The rose- bud smiling 
 on its fragile stem, may remind us that thus are the 
 flowers of life, frail and perishing. But the Seasons 
 are the most faithful monitor. They remind us, as 
 they wheel their silent round, in a language too 
 plain to be mistaken, that Life hath its Seasons, 
 and that they pass away ! Let us then give heed to 
 their lesson, and profit by their instruction. Let us 
 be admonished that youth is the seed-time of life, 
 and that " what a man soweth, that shall he also 
 reap :" and let us sow abundantly of the rich seeds 
 
THE SEASONS. 121 
 
 of virtue and knowledge. Thus will our Spring- 
 time be rendered profitable and delightful — our 
 Summer will bear pleasing testimony to our labors — 
 our Autumn will be redolent of fruits — and the fire- 
 side of our Winter will be cheered and enlivened 
 by the treasures of the mental store-house— the 
 Granary of the Soul. 
 
122 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 HER SPIRIT HATH FLOWN TO ITS REST. 
 
 BY C. W. EVEREST. 
 
 Her spirit hath flown to its rest, 
 
 Afar from our sorrowing clod; 
 To the bright happy land of the blest, ' 
 
 And the smiles of its glorious God : 
 She lingered a season below, 
 
 But to wash from her spirit the stain: 
 Then soared from our valley of wo, 
 
 To the far heights of glory again ! 
 
 She hath flown to the mansions above, 
 
 And found out the blood-ransomed throng ; 
 She hath drank of the fountains of love, 
 
 And joined in the Seraphim's song ; 
 She hath gone to the land of her birth, 
 
 Where the anthems of holiness rise ; 
 She wearied with dwelling on earth, 
 
 And returned to her home in the skies ! 
 
 Her spirit hath flown to its rest, 
 
 Its sorrows and sufferings o'er ; 
 It hath gained the far clime of the blest, — 
 
 It will visit our cold earth no more ! 
 Then weep not — 'twere sinful to mourn, 
 
 That the Tyrant our fond hope hath riven : 
 Though she's gone, and no more may return, 
 
 She bathes in the glory of Heaven ! 
 
THIBALT D'AUVKRGNE. 123 
 
 THIBALT D'AUVERGNE. 
 
 BY HAZLETON WALKLEY. 
 
 " Where is the Count D' Auvergne 1 I owe him life. 
 Stand back Guillaume des Barres ! Your foot is on 
 his chest. That is he in the black armor I " * * * 
 
 " The Count made another effort to speak. The 
 king stooped over him, and inclined his ear. ' Tell 
 her,' said the broken accents of the dying man, ' tell 
 her, that for her love, 1 died to save your life.' " 
 
 " ' I will,' said Philip Augustus, ' on my faith, I 
 will ! and I know her not, or she will weep your 
 fall.' " Philip Augustus. 
 
 The sun above the tented field, 
 
 Rose o'er the hills of France ; 
 His beams flashed bright on spear and shield, 
 
 Helmet and polished lance ; 
 For hosts of arm'ed men were there, 
 
 In battle's stern array, 
 Each heart heat quick — each hlade was bare, 
 
 Impatient for the fray. 
 
 Her laurel wreath, in fevered dream, 
 
 Already Fancy weaves ; 
 And youthful ardor, at the gleam, 
 
 Pants for the rustling leaves : 
 
124 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Oh ! many a brain that inly burns 
 
 With hopes of high renown, 
 Will strew the clod the ploughman turns 
 
 Before the sun goes down. 
 
 A monarch with a monarch's power 
 
 Was on the battle plain, 
 Who ne'er would to another cower 
 
 Though all his hosts were slain ; 
 Against oppression's blackened woes 
 
 His noble blade was bare, 
 And he would quell his haughty foes, 
 
 Or bravely perish there. 
 
 But there was not, of all the throng 
 
 That swelled that monarch's might, 
 A knight more brave, an arm more strong, 
 
 Or practised more in fight, 
 Than he with crest of sable dye, 
 
 And armor black as night, 
 Who marked, as with a heedless eye, 
 
 The dread, approaching fight. 
 
 His steed, that chafing pawed the ground, 
 
 The battle's fearful din— 
 The dying shriek— the onset sound — 
 
 What were they all to him I 
 Deep in his breast consuming lies, 
 
 With ashes strewn above, 
 The wasting spark that never dies, 
 
 Of unrequited love. 
 
THIBALT D'AUVERGNE. 125 
 
 Aye, he had loved in early years, 
 
 Ere Manhood on his brow 
 Had furrowed out its thousand cares, 
 
 Or blanched its cheerful glow ! 
 His love, which language ill reveals, 
 
 Was for a matchless one ; 
 Devotion, deep as the Indian feels 
 
 Who bows him to the sun. 
 
 Strong as the heart's deep passions are, 
 
 Ere youthful dreams have flown, 
 His hope, his all was centered there, 
 
 He lived for her alone ! 
 Though France held not a nobler name, 
 
 Though of his house the pride, 
 Yet dared he not, unknown to fame, 
 
 To ask her for his bride ! 
 
 Years passed away — that knight had been 
 
 With warriors of renown, 
 Where ranks of the proud Saracen, 
 
 Before his sword went down ; 
 And every battle that he won, 
 
 And every field he fought 
 Had but, for him, one hope alone — 
 
 To win the love he sought. 
 
 The foe was quelled— the wars were o'er- 
 
 The Holy Land was free ; 
 He sought the ancient halls once more, 
 
 Of his young idolatry. 
 
126 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 The scenes that met his eager gaze, 
 
 Each valley, hill and plain, 
 Renewed the thoughts of other days, 
 
 And boyhood's dreams again. 
 
 The stream, to whose bright waters' play 
 
 The wild flower nodded o'er, 
 Still murmured on its pebbled way 
 
 As peaceful as before ; 
 And still those grey old towers were there, 
 
 The lofty trees above, 
 Where he had shown a lover's care, 
 
 And won— a sister's love. 
 
 But where was she ?— the fair— the young, 
 
 Who had his idol been ; 
 And why came not that beauteous one 
 
 To smile upon him then ? 
 Woe for his fame — the deeds of arms, 
 
 That swelled his name of pride ! 
 That peerless one, with all her charms, 
 
 Is now a Monarch's bride ! 
 
 To the warm fountain of his dreams 
 
 A freezing current rolled ; 
 Curdled its warm, its ardent streams, 
 
 And left them sad and cold. 
 The golden cords, that bound his heart 
 
 To life — to hope — to bliss — 
 At one fell blow were torn apart, 
 
 And all was loneliness ! 
 
THIBALT d'aUVERGNE. 127 
 
 And the wide world was all to him 
 
 A barren desert wild, 
 Where sprung to light no living thing, 
 
 Nor blossom ever smiled. 
 Now, he is on the battle plain, 
 
 The brave are sweeping by, 
 With a monarch rival's glittering train 
 
 He is marshalled forth — to die. 
 
 And to his ear swelled loudly out 
 
 The brazen armor's clang ; 
 The onset charge— the battle shout 
 
 Of deadly conflict rang : 
 Yet still he checked his chafing steed, 
 
 And lingered from the fray, 
 For little did that lone one heed 
 
 How went the doubtful day. 
 
 But hark ! whence comes the yielding cry, 
 
 So wildly borne in air 1 
 And whose the shout of victory 
 
 So loudly echoed there 1 
 See ! in the maddening tumult tossed, 
 
 Monarch and banner reel, 
 One moment more, and all is lost ! 
 
 And France and Freedom yield ! 
 
 One lingering look the warrior took 
 
 Of earth, of sky and main, 
 For well he knew that glorious book 
 
 He ne'er might read again ; 
 
128 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Then spurred his courser with his might 
 
 Free o'er the fallen brave — 
 He plunged into the thickest fight, 
 
 To rescue and to save ! 
 
 Woe to the wretch who dares to stand 
 
 Athwart his reckless way ! 
 Or seeks to raise a recreant hand 
 
 His whirlwind course to stay ! 
 Destruction waits on every blow — 
 
 Around him are the slain — 
 The tide is turned upon the foe ; 
 
 The king is up again ! 
 * * * * * * 
 
 The storm is past ; the strife is o'er : 
 
 The conquering hosts return ; 
 France waves her banner proud once more, 
 
 But where is brave D'Auvergne ? 
 Look where was turned the doubtful strife 
 
 Amid the thickest dead ; 
 There, as he saved a rival's life, 
 
 His woes— his sorrows fled ! 
 
HOME OF THE DESOLATE. 129 
 
 THE HOME OF THE DESOLATE. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 BY C. W. EVEREST. 
 
 " How many drink the cup 
 Of baleful grief, or eat the bitter bread 
 Of misery ! Sore pierced by wintry winds, 
 How many shrink into the sordid hut 
 Of cheerless poverty !" 
 
 Thomson. 
 
 It was night — the storm howled sadly by— and 
 the mother sat in silence by the scanty fire, that 
 warmed and faintly lighted the wretched, dilapida- 
 ted cottage, once, in brighter days, her happy home ! 
 She had divided to her ragged and starving babes 
 the little pittance of bread remaining to her, yet 
 scarcely sufficing to satisfy the mad cravings of 
 hunger! Little thought they that they claimed 
 their mother's all : yet freely was it given, with a 
 silent tear that it was all 1 She hushed their cries 
 — soothed their sorrows — covered them with her 
 tattered mantle— bade them a sad ' good-nighf— 
 and returned to her sorrowful vigil. 
 
 The night wore away, — and still sat the mother 
 over the fading fire she could not replenish, waiting 
 the coming of him whose returning footsteps once 
 caused a thrill of joy through her bosom, and was 
 hailed with boisterous glee by his little ones. Once, 
 
 9 
 
130 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 lie promised at the altar to love and cherish her, 
 and nobly, awhile, did he redeem the pledge. His 
 cottage was the home of comfort, and his wife and 
 infants divided his love ! But ah ! how changed ! 
 He had become a Drunkard ! His business was 
 neglected— his home was deserted— and his late re- 
 turn was but the harbinger of woe ! He came to 
 curse the innocent partner of his misery as the 
 author of his wretchedness, and his frightened chil- 
 dren shrunk away from him, screaming, as from a 
 fiend ! Where waits he now ? The shadows of 
 night have long darkened the landscape ! What 
 delays his return 1— Alas ! the low haunt which has 
 nightly witnessed the shameful revel, now echoes 
 to his frantic shout ! Surrounded by boon compan- 
 ions, he seeks to drown the memory of his sorrows 
 in the bowl : while his wretched, starving, squalid 
 wife still keeps her lonely vigil by her lonely hearth ! 
 Stillness — solemn stillness, like the grave's, reigns 
 in that dreary habitation : and no sound is heard, 
 save when the fitful sighing of the wintry blast, or 
 the low murmur of her dreaming infants, rouses 
 the watcher from her trance. Then she raises her 
 aching eyes to the dim dial, and with a glance to 
 Heaven, turns to her lonely watch again. But now 
 « the tempest of her feelings has grown too fierce to 
 be repressed"— her bosom heaves with the wild 
 emotions of her soul— and her thin hands seem en- 
 deavoring to force back the bursting torrent of her 
 tears! ****** 
 
 * * * The clock struck the hour of 
 
 midnight— and he came as wont ! With a fearful 
 
HOME OF THE DESOLATE. 131 
 
 oath, he cursed his wife's fond care : and that 
 mother's silent tears, and the low wail of his fright- 
 ened babes, went up to God for witness ! * * 
 Would you know the conclusion of the story ? Go,, 
 ask the jail, the almshouse, and the grave— and they 
 will tell you ! 
 
132 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 TO A CRICKET. 
 
 Cease, cricket ! cease thy melancholy song , 
 Its chiming cadence falls upon my ear 
 
 With such a saddening influence all day long, 
 I cannot bear those mournful notes to hear — 
 Notes that will often start the unbidden tear, 
 
 And wake the heart to memories of old days, 
 When life knew not a sorrow or a fear — 
 
 Forever basking in the sunny rays, 
 
 Which seem so passing bright to youth's all trustful 
 gaze. 
 
 Once more my steps are stayed at eventide, 
 Beneath the fairest moon that ever shone, 
 
 Where the old oak threw out its branches wide 
 Over the low roof of mine early home, 
 Ere yet my bosom knew a wish to roam 
 
 From the broad shelter of that ancient tree, 
 Or dreamed of other lands beside our own, 
 
 Beyond the boundary of that flowery lea — 
 
 For the green valley there was world enough for me. 
 
 A group are gathered round the household hearth, 
 Where chilly autumn bids the bright flame play, 
 
 And social converse sweet, and childhood's mirth, 
 Swiftly beguile the lengthened eve away: 
 
TO A CRICKET. 133 
 
 A laughing girl shakes back her tresses gay, 
 With a half doubtful look, and wondering tone — 
 
 " Hark ! there is music ! do you hear the lay 1 
 Mother, what is it singing in the stone — 
 Some luckless fairy wight imprisioned there alone 7" 
 
 'Tis memory all, which doth the spell renew ; 
 
 And though thy notes may strike the " electric 
 chain," 
 Thou canst not bring those buried forms to view, 
 
 Or give me back my happy days again. 
 
 Alone— I am alone : these tears in vain 
 For the loved tenants of the tomb are given ; 
 
 They sleep — no more to suffer grief or pain, 
 No more to gaze upon the starlit heaven, 
 Or with hushed hearts to list thy solemn strain at 
 even. 
 
 Wake nrjt remembrance thus ! for stern the fate 
 
 That marks my pathway with a weary doom ; 
 And to a heart so worn and desolate, 
 
 Thy boding voice may add a deeper gloom. 
 
 Tho' few the clouds which o'er the blue sky roam, 
 And green the livery of our forest bowers, 
 
 To warn us of a sure decay ye come, 
 In sable guise, trailing the faded flowers, 
 Singing the death-song sad of summer's waning 
 hours. 
 
 Those emerald robes will change to russet brown, 
 Which summer over vale and hill-side cast ; 
 
 To other skies that know no wintry frown, 
 
 Bright birds shall wing their weary way at last ; 
 
134 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 And autumn's hectic hues which fade so fast, 
 Will make the dark old woods awhile look gay ; 
 
 But death must come when the rare show is past- 
 Then cease thy chant, dark prophet of decay ! 
 I cannot bear to Jiear thy melancholy lay. 
 
THE WATERFALL. 135 
 
 THE WATERFALL. 
 
 A BONNET. 
 BY ISAAC C. PRAT. 
 
 How still the scene, save where the waters pour 
 Broad, massy sheets of silver far below 
 Upon the gulf whence circling eddies flow, 
 
 And revel with a wild, eternal roar ! 
 
 Swift dash the impetuous torrents o'er the rocks ; 
 Continuous clouds of foam like war-steeds spring, 
 And, meeting wildly in the whirling ring, 
 
 First plunge, then toss on high their necks' white 
 locks. 
 
 Along the verge, where turn the waters o'er, 
 And at the base, where roving billows rush 
 Headlong, with mad, interminable gush, 
 
 The mist ascends, enrobing all the shore. 
 
 Faint starlight glows now flush upon the scene. 
 
 And decks a throne for Night's advancing Queen. 
 
136 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 LINES TO MY SISTER: 
 
 Written in iier Album. 
 BY MELZAR GARDNER. 
 
 My sister dear, the thoughts 1 bring, 
 
 As flowers, to deck this spotless page, 
 Perchance may seem like those that spring 
 
 From roots that feel the blight of age; 
 But at the mention of that word — 
 
 My sister! — youth awakes again, 
 And pleasant memories are stirred, 
 
 Of days unmarked by care or pain. 
 
 Fond, faded hopes — the venom'd breath 
 
 Of calumny — the blight of care — 
 These mark, as with the touch of Death, 
 
 Some of the later " hours that were ;" 
 But back, beyond that darksome sea 
 
 Of pain, and care, and grief, and tears, 
 I find, when Memory turns to thee, 
 
 The buried joys of childhood's years. 
 
 And though in other lands I roam- 
 Though other ties my fondness prove- 
 Though here I find another home, 
 
 And wife and children share my love — 
 Though "husband !" " father!" have a sound 
 
 As sweet as "brother," used to be ! 
 Yet in my heart will aye be found, 
 Room — my dear sister — room for thec! — 
 
LINES TO MY SISTER. 137 
 
 And Mary, my most fervent prayer 
 
 Is, that thy life may ever be 
 As calm, as when the summer air 
 
 Is sleeping on a moonlit sea ; — 
 Bright, as the day-god's earliest glance — 
 
 Sweet, as a song at midnight heard — 
 And gladsome, as the ripple's dance, 
 
 When by the soft-winged zephyrs stirred ! 
 
 Should Pain or Sorrow ever shroud 
 
 The blessed light of thy young years, 
 May Hope's effulgence, through the cloud, 
 
 Beam on thine heart though seen through tears ; 
 May Faith the dark illusion break, 
 
 And Love wipe off each tear that flows, 
 As morning breezes gently shake 
 
 The glistening dew-drop from the rose ! 
 
 May Purity's white robe be spread, 
 
 In ample fulness, round thy form ! 
 Earth's choicest joys on thee be shed ! 
 
 Life's sunshine thine, without the storm ! 
 And when the things of time and sense 
 
 Shall fade, as stars when day is dawning— 
 Oh, may thy soul soar gladly hence, 
 
 To bask in Heaven's eternal morning ! 
 Hartford, August, 1839. 
 
138 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 JUNE. 
 BY M. A. DODD. 
 
 I sing thy beauties now, 
 Month of the golden morn and sunny noon ; 
 For fairest of the sister-three art thou, 
 
 O lovely, smiling June ! 
 
 How gay this world of ours, 
 When thou dost all around rich roses fling ; 
 And to the hill- side, and the garden bowers, 
 
 Bloom in profusion bring. 
 
 Now is the time for hope ; 
 Now should the poet's dial tell the hours 
 Which marks the moments by the buds that opo, 
 
 Or folding of the flowers. 
 
 For those who seek her love, 
 Nature holds court in a gay-decked saloon, 
 Where the rich tapestry is all inwove 
 
 With leaves and flowers of June. 
 
 Sweet doth the music come 
 From zephyr's harp in the green branches stirr'd, 
 The lay of glancing streams, and insect hum, 
 
 And song of summer bird. 
 
139 
 
 The morning sunlight shines, 
 Robing in golden mist the laughing stream — 
 Shedding a glory where the red rose twines, 
 
 And many dew-drops gleam. 
 
 The moonbeams pale and mild, 
 Look down upon the buds that folded sleep, 
 Like a young mother watching o'er her child, 
 
 With love so pure and deep. 
 
 Thy joyous presence lends 
 To every heart that droops, its cheering boon : 
 Oh, blessed is the bounteous hand that sends 
 
 The leaves and flowers of June. 
 
140 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 THE SWALLOW. 
 
 BY WILLIAM FALCONER. 
 
 " Oh, downcast bouI ! like it thou wert as gay, 
 When Life was in its May." 
 
 I. 
 
 When Youth's bright years went by like Summer r 
 
 hours, 
 Their sunny brows arrayed in Summer flowers- 
 Ami through the Future's void Hope's warm smile' 
 glowed, 
 
 Cheering my onward road- 
 Nursed by the sun of my prosperity, 
 My spirit teemed with generous Poesy, 
 And soared to Heaven's gate on raptured wing, 
 
 A free and glorious thing, 
 Pure as a sylph amid the blue of June, 
 When forest-boughs their leafy harps attune, 
 And blend their music with the heavens above, 
 
 In one sweet hymn of Love. 
 
 II. 
 
 The gladsome Swallow thus, i' the balmy weather, 
 
 When Spring and it revisit us together, 
 
 Sports through the rain-washed blue, and builds its 
 
 bower 
 Within the loftiest tower : 
 Changeful as Thought — companion of the breeze — 
 Brushing with snow-flaked breast the cloudlet's 
 
 fleece— 
 
THE SWALLOW. 141 
 
 Now in the willowed lake its long wing dipping, 
 
 With liquid silver dripping — 
 Then up again, as if 't were not of earth, 
 Among the skyey boughs it wheels in mirth, 
 Or through the hoary turret's loopholes narrow, 
 
 Darts like a barbed arrow. 
 
 III. 
 But when the thunder o'er the hills is pealing, 
 And storm-clouds slow o'er Heaven's blue fields are 
 
 stealing, 
 While the chill mist falls shroud-like o'er the vale, 
 
 Turning the waters pale — 
 In circles narrowing, close to earth it skims, 
 While forest birds have hushed their warbled hymns, 
 As if it something sought— but soon above 
 
 It finds its nest of love. 
 
 IV. 
 
 And thus, my soul, when sorrow's blasts have blown, 
 And Care's dull mist around my path is thrown, 
 While gathering clouds foretell the coming storm, 
 
 In its most vengeful form — 
 Flits o'er the chequered Past, around each spot 
 Where Love hath dwelt, long sanctified by Thought, 
 Seeking some relic faint, yet left behind, 
 
 Of all that smiled so kind — 
 Its storm-steeped wings too weak to reach, on high 
 Fancy's soft nest amid the perfumed sky, 
 Above the mist that robs it of the beams 
 
 Which lit its earlier dreams. 
 
142 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 V. 
 
 When on pale Autumn Winter pours his wrath, 
 And sweeps the rose-leaves from the woodland path, 
 And of their leafy honors strips the bowers, 
 
 Widowed of all their flowers — 
 The summer swallow, on exploring wing, — 
 Led by bright Hope, the sister of the Spring, — 
 Finds, in the realms of Morn, a tranquil home, 
 
 Beyond the billow's foam. 
 O ! may my soul, when wintry Life is flown, 
 And my frail dust is garnered 'neath the stone, 
 Find peaceful rest — like it on brighter shore, 
 
 As fond I deemed of yore, 
 When, at my mother's knee, that page I read 
 Which speaks of Him whose brow with anguish 
 
 bled— 
 'Parted before us, to prepare a place 
 
 Before His Father's face ! 
 
 Paris, 1839, 
 
143 
 
 THE FKIENDS WE LOVED IN CIHLDHOOD. 
 
 BY C. W. EVEREST. 
 
 The friends we loved in childhood, 
 
 O, whither have they fled? 
 Beneath the village churchyard, 
 
 They slumber with the dead! 
 In peace they rest beneath the sod, 
 
 Their earthly labors o'er : 
 O, the friends that we loved in our early youth, 
 
 We shall meet on earth no more ! 
 
 The friends we loved in childhood, 
 
 When life was young and gay — 
 How blithesome were their bosoma 
 
 Throughout the joyous day ; 
 And lightly tripped their merry feet 
 
 Across the flowery plain — 
 But the friends that we loved in our early youth 
 
 We ne'er shall meet again ! 
 
 The friends we loved in childhood, 
 
 How fond their memory seems ! 
 They haunt us in our slumbers— 
 
 They whisper in our dreams ! 
 
144 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 And then we wake, with saddened heart, 
 
 To find our bliss but vain : 
 For the friends that we loved in our early youth, 
 
 We ne'er shall meet again ! 
 
 The friends we loved in childhood, 
 
 O, peaceful be their rest; 
 And green may be the willow, 
 
 That sighs above their breast ! 
 And when in death we lowly sleep, 
 
 Secure from all our pain ; — 
 O, the friends that we loved in our early youth, 
 
 May we meet in peace again ! 
 
A WALK IN THE FOREST. 145 
 
 A WALK IN THE FOREST. 
 
 BY MISS M. L. GARDNER. 
 
 I love thy calm and cool retreats— sweet wood ! 
 Above— around me — leaf and bough entwined, 
 Shut out from hearing and the visual sense, 
 The sounds and sights that tell me of the world — 
 Its cares — its envyings, and its bitter strifes — 
 Making me loath existence ! 'Mid thine aisles, 
 I feel a spiritual presence, ever near, 
 Breaking the ties that bind my soul to earth, 
 And earth-born thoughts ; and I can soar away, 
 As on the zephyr's airy pinions borne, 
 Till life becomes etherial, and is lost 
 As in a new existence, rapt with joy 
 That seems almost divine. 
 
 It oft is said — 
 That sin hath blighted all this beauteous earth ; 
 That all things bright and pleasant to the eye, 
 When tasted, " turn to ashes on the lip !" 
 Thou who thus thinkest— thou whose ear is pained 
 By tales of envy, jealousy or strife, — 
 Enter with me these calm sequestered shades 
 Leaving behind thee all those passions vile, 
 That in their workings move the restless world. 
 10 
 
146 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Sit down with me, upon the vine-wrapped rock- 
 Hoary with centuries of storm and age — 
 Beneath this gnarled and ancient tree, whose roots 
 Glide serpent-like into its crevices. The brook 
 That sparkles as it passes by, bedecks 
 Our grassy carpet with a silver fringe! 
 The sun from 'mid his azure sphere steals through 
 The woven shadows, with a softened light, 
 Like Faith's pure ray, upon a care-worn heart. 
 The gentle breeze, in dalliance with my hair, 
 Parteth it on my forehead, that my brow 
 May feel its coolness, while my heart drinks In 
 The sweetness it hath stolen from the flowers. 
 Birds, 'mid the branches round us, joyous sing, — 
 And insects, on their gilded wings flit by, 
 Pleased with the softened sunshine, and move on 
 In mazy motions, e'en as if their dance 
 Was, by the singing brooks sweet music moved. 
 
 There is no sadness here ; but fnnocence 
 And twin-born Peace and Love, have here their 
 
 home ! 
 Here we may learn that the primeval curse 
 Fell not in vengeance ; that to guilt alone 
 Is misery wed — it is not wed to earth. 
 
 Ye who endure, learn how you may enjoy ! 
 Ye who at heart are sick of earth's vain joys, 
 Its gilded pomp, its heartless fellowships, 
 And all the ills, that mist-like dim the eye, 
 Or seem to mar the perfect work of God, — 
 Go to some sweet retreat like this, and list 
 To Nature's kindly ministrations there. 
 
A WALK IN THE FOREST. 147 
 
 The forest's wind-born sighs— the pleasant sound 
 Of distant torrent, and of rippling brook — 
 The song of birds— the insects' cheerful hum— 
 These with a strong yet soothing spell, shall change 
 Life from endurance to enjoyment sweet ; 
 And thou to toil or pleasure may go forth, — 
 Thine heart to kindly sympathies attuned, — 
 Pleased with the birds, the flowers, and with thy 
 
 kind, 
 And happy with the fair and blessed world. 
 
 Hingham, Mass, 1839. 
 
148 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 THE TURQUOISE RING. 
 
 In Miss Martineau's novel of Doerbrook, the heroine is made 
 to preserve, with great care, a Turquoise ring, which her lover had 
 given her in the early days of his attachment, and, during a long 
 period of doubt and estrangement, to believe that while its hues 
 continued undimmed, his faith remained to her unbroken. So 
 poetic and fervent a belief met with its appropriate reward— the 
 Turquoise remained bright, and the lover returned. 
 
 The Turquoise ring ! 'twas a gift of power, 
 Guarding her heart in that weary hour, 
 As a magic spell, as a gem of light, 
 As a pure, pure star amidst clouds of night ; 
 Bringing back to the pale, pale cheek its bloom, 
 Strengthening her faith in that hour of doom : 
 There was hope, there was trust in its living hue ; 
 The gem was bright, and the lover true ; 
 As a sign to her heart, as a sign to her eye, 
 The one bright gleam of a troubled sky. 
 
 The Turquoise ring ! oh, the olden time 
 Had many a magic tale and sign- 
 Bright gifts of treasure on land and on sea, 
 But nought for the heart or the memory ; 
 For what might the fairy lamp of old 
 Yield to its owner, but gems and gold ? 
 And to her who sat in that lonely hall, 
 The Turquoise ring was worth them all ; 
 
THE TURQUOISE RING. 149 
 
 For the heart hath a dearer wealth than lies 
 
 In the Earth's wide halls and argosies, 
 
 And its hopes are more precious than gems or gold, 
 
 When richest and rarest, by miser told ; 
 
 For what had been gems that brightly shone, 
 
 To her who sat in her grief alone 1 
 
 Oh, the Turquoise ring had a spell of power — 
 
 This was a gift for the weary hour, 
 
 Linking the future to all the past, 
 
 Breathing of moments too bright to last, 
 
 Till they came in the light of their living bliss, 
 
 To soothe, to gladden an hour like this. 
 
 Oh, Love hath wings, they have said, who knew — 
 
 And that Love hath wings, is a story true ; 
 
 But there lingers a bloom on his early hours, 
 
 When his wings are folded 'midst opening flowers, 
 
 When the streams are bright, and the sky is fair, 
 
 And the hearts too happy that trust him there, 
 
 There lingers a bloom, and there rests a glow— 
 
 A charm that the Earth not again may know ; 
 
 And when from that resting place he flies, 
 
 Oh, linked with a thousand memories, 
 
 Each bud and each leaf, by our fond tears wet, 
 
 May breathe of his sweetness and beauty yet. 
 
 So with the Past, and its holy love — 
 Bo with its hopes that soared above, 
 And the visions that came to her nightly rest- 
 Was the Turquoise ring to her finger pressed. 
 Oh, beautiful to her its light ! 
 Could she forget that pleasant night, 
 
150 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 When first her finger's slender round 
 Was with the golden circlet hound, 
 And hlushed she — not to see it shine, 
 But at the low tone — "Love, be mine V 
 
 Since then, since then, unchanged its hue, 
 Her hope, her trust, alike were true ; 
 But pale at times that cheek so bright, 
 And dimmed those eyes of living light, — 
 For dreams were hers of pain and dread, — 
 Yet still the ring its lustre shed: 
 They met and parted, as of yore 
 Fond hearts have met and chilled before ; 
 And coldness, sadness, fear had been 
 Like cloud upon the sunny scene ! 
 
 Yet Woman's love will always strive, 
 And Woman's faith through all things live ; 
 And beautiful the maiden's truth, 
 And beautiful her trusting youth : — 
 Through all, through all, the Turquoise ring 
 A dream, a hope, a joy could bring ; 
 And still, if clear and bright its hue, 
 The trust was firm— the lover true ! 
 
 Oh, gift of power ! it brought, at last, 
 A bright, bright future for the past! 
 Oh, gift of power ! that cheek once more 
 Wore the rich bloom that blushed of yore: 
 Oh, gift of power ! who would not sing 
 For me, for me, the Turquoise ring ! 
 For me, for me, when living Faith 
 Faints in a world of Change and Death — 
 
THE TURQUOISE RING. 151 
 
 When sick with fear the heart may bo, 
 And sad, oh sad, the memory — 
 When dimly, dimly, dimly glow 
 The hopes, the trust that clings below — 
 Then give me, give the Turquoise ring, 
 Or the pure faith— a better thing! 
 
 Lucy Hooper. 
 Brooklyn, L. I., Sept. 10, 1839. 
 
152 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 THE EVENING LAY. 
 
 BY C. W. EVEREST. 
 
 The sun had sunk in stately mien, 
 
 Behind the glowing west; 
 And Nature spread her loveliest scene, 
 
 To tranquilize the breast : 
 Wooed by the hour, I wandered forth, 
 
 Far from the city's strife; 
 Forgetting, as of nothing worth, 
 
 The joys and ills of life. 
 
 The silvery moonbeams kissed the flowers, 
 
 In Summer's loveliest trim ; 
 The birds within their silent bowers, 
 
 Had ceased their evening hymn: 
 Unconscious, through a smiling vale, 
 
 My path had led afar ; 
 When on the evening's gentle gale, 
 
 I heard a light guitar. 
 
 A maiden kneeled within a grove, 
 
 Bathed in the hallowed glow ; 
 Made sacred by the holiest love 
 
 A mortal heart can know : 
 Here she had wandered all alone, 
 
 From home and friends away; 
 And in a voice of sweetest tone 
 
 She breathed an Evening Lay. 
 
THE EVENING LAY. 153 
 
 It did not to the class belong 
 
 By Genius' favorites given ; 
 'Twas but a simple evening song, 
 
 Of grateful thanks to Heaven : 
 Far from the crowd, she knew no fear 
 
 Her debt of love to pay; 
 And thought that only God was near, 
 
 To hear her Evening Lay. 
 
 I gazed in awe : so fair, so young, 
 
 Glowing with holiest fire ; 
 It seemed an angel's sinless tongue, 
 
 An angei's golden lyre ! 
 Gently the numbers died away ; 
 
 I saw the maid depart ; 
 And sorrow with resistless sway, 
 
 Stole o'er my saddened heart. 
 
 I lingered, as by magic spell, 
 
 Along that valley's plain ; 
 Then gave a look of sad farewell, 
 
 And sought the world again : 
 The dreams of bliss— hope's flattering tale, 
 
 Enticed my feet afar ; 
 But oft would fancy rove the vale, 
 
 And hear the sweet guitar. 
 
 I've tasted what earth calls delight, 
 
 I've bowed at Folly's shrine ; 
 And wealth has opened on my sight 
 
 Its beauties, half divine : 
 But what are all the swelling train, 
 
 That roll in pride along 1 
 I'd give them all to hear again 
 
 That country maiden's song. 
 
154 THE MOSS-UOSE. 
 
 Where Pleasure's stream has murmured by, 
 
 I've knelt me down to sip ; 
 I've drank the light of Beauty's eye, 
 
 The smile of Beauty's lip; 
 And pomp has played its wildering part, 
 
 And wit has ruled the day; 
 But nothing yet has touched my heart, 
 
 Like that sweet Evening Lay. 
 
 I've stood beneath the fretted dome, 
 
 To holiest worship given, 
 When the loud anthem's swelling tono 
 
 Pealed to the listening heaven : 
 Awhile, entranced, I heard the strain, — 
 
 Then turned in grief away, 
 And sighed, to hear but once again, 
 
 That simple Evening Lay ! 
 
 When tossing on the couch of rest, 
 
 A stranger to repose, 
 And harrowing cares distract the breast, 
 
 Of earth and earthly woes ; 
 When plodding o'er life's mournful track, 
 
 To wretchedness a prey ; 
 Then soft on Memory's pinions back 
 
 Is borne that Evening Lay. 
 Let Age its onward numbers roll, — 
 
 'Twill calm my troubled breast, 
 And heal the sorrows of a soul 
 
 By earthly cares distressed : 
 But though before its withering pace 
 
 Our early loves decay — 
 It cannot from my mind efface 
 
 That simple Evening Lay. 
 
THE DEPARTURE. 155 
 
 THE DEPARTURE. 
 
 Affectionately inscribed to his eldei sister: 
 BY MELZAR GARDNER. 
 
 A bright, a glorious day in Spring! 
 
 No cloud upon the azure deep : — 
 A morn so lovely, it might bring 
 
 New sweetness to an infant's sleep ! 
 The seaman fondly lingers there — 
 The white sail woos the fragrant air — 
 His heart with Hope is beating high — 
 A tear is in the young wife's eye ! 
 
 'Tis noon !— across the broad blue sea, 
 
 The gallant barque speeds proudly on ; 
 And joy-lit eyes look up to see 
 
 Her pennons floating in the sun. 
 The whirling eddies mark her way, 
 And 'neath her prow, the snow-white spray, 
 Like newly crumbled silver, gleams 
 Ami sparkles in the day-god's beams! 
 
 'Tis eve ! — the sea-bird sports beside 
 Her glowing pathway o'er the deep, 
 
 Where, like a war-horse nerved with pride, 
 From wave to wave she seems to leap. 
 
 Each pulse is quickened, as the blast 
 
 Distends the sail, or bends the mast; 
 
 And when the sun hath left the sky, 
 
 Hope warms the heart and lights the eye 
 
156 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Alone — upon a beetling hill, 
 
 That braves the ocean's breaking surge- 
 The fond young wife is lingering still, 
 
 And gazing on the horizon's verge. 
 One long, long look of love — the last! 
 The proud ship from her sight hath past ! 
 She turns away— she breathes a prayer — 
 Her hope, her love, her heart is there ! 
 
 Speed on, speed on, thou gallant barque ! 
 
 That gentle heart is with thee now, 
 Where tempests gather fierce and dark, 
 
 Or favoring breezes gently blow : — 
 That love shall bless thy sunny path, 
 That hope defy the storm-god's wrath ; 
 And thou shalt bring, from o'er the main, 
 The wanderer to his home again ! 
 
 Hartford, September, 1839. 
 
SONG IN JUNE. 157 
 
 SONG IN JUNE. 
 
 BY W. FALCONER. 
 I. 
 
 'Tis the leafy month of June; 
 Brooks now sing a quiet tune ; 
 None can hail the morn too soon — 
 
 Wherefore sleepest thou t 
 Deem'st thou that the argent moon 
 
 Yet shines on Heaven's brow ? 
 
 II. 
 
 Amber beauty fills the bowera, 
 Where the elder, rich in flowers, 
 Sparkles in the am'rous showers, 
 
 In our chapel green : 
 Let us spend the summer hours, 
 
 Loving all unseen. 
 
 III. 
 
 Birds our choristers shall be, 
 
 As on Fancy's fairy lea, 
 
 Like the sweet, harmonious bee 
 
 In the scented air : 
 Thought's pure passion-flowers, shall we 
 
 Seek to banish care. 
 
158 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Fays are rocked i' the fresh hurts ; 
 Dryads roam the brightening woods ; 
 Naiads, 'neath their gelid floods, 
 
 Chase the fishes bright : 
 Why, in cities' dim abodes, 
 
 Lose such full delight 3 
 
 V. 
 
 TheRk but chains and settled gloom, 
 Thirst of gold and early tomb — 
 Hope and Health together bloom, 
 
 Twin flowers here in birth : 
 Why thy golden Youth consume 
 
 'Mid the city's dearth "? 
 
 Versailles, 1839. 
 
159 
 
 SONNETS : 
 
 Y O. W. KVBRBST. 
 
 To "J. D.,"Authu» of Spring, Summer, Autumn and Wintei 
 Bonuets. 
 
 Bard of the pleasant lyre ! where'er thy strain 
 
 Breaks on the stillness of the listening air — 
 Whether in Spring-time, o'er the grassy plain, 
 
 With careless step you rove, mid flowrets fair — 
 Whether through Summer's fervid walks you stray, 
 And mark the waters and the winds at play — 
 
 Whether mid Autumn's stores of ripening gold 
 Thou rovest, pensive, mid the dying flowers — 
 
 Or Winter calls thee, with his voice cold, 
 To muse, instructed, 'mong the leafless bowers — 
 My heart is with thee : Through the joyous hours 
 
 I roam, with thee, o'er scenes so proudly told ! 
 By brook, by glen, on mountain-top I stand — 
 Turns my fond soul to thee, and my loved Father- 
 land ! 
 
160 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 II. 
 Dixon ! our own New England land is fair, 
 
 And happy faces glad its pleasant vales ; 
 And voices whisper on its haunted air, 
 
 Where olden memories breathe their hallowed 
 tales ! 
 But come, my friend, and rove awhile with me, 
 And Southern scenes shall spread a feast for thee ! 
 
 The Bard is Nature's priest : where'er she reigns, 
 There may he find an altar ; and his soul 
 
 May offer up its incense ! Seek the plains 
 Where the bright South doth woo with sweet control: 
 
 Here noble hearts will cheer us ; while the strains 
 Of warbling birds, more sweet than notes which 
 
 stole 
 From Orpheus' lyre, shall win us, for a time, 
 To linger from our own, to bless the Southern clime ! 
 
 North Carolina, August 22, 1839. 
 
MY SISTER. 161 
 
 MY SISTER. 
 
 BY WILLIAM FALCONER. 
 
 friend, when T was very young 
 I had a lovely sister— 
 
 The word yet stammered on my tongue, 
 When one May-morn I missed her. 
 
 To me she was an angel mild — 
 A most enduring mother — 
 
 For since I was a wanton child, 
 I never knew another. 
 
 1 sat heneath the lilac spray, 
 Plucking the silver daisies, 
 
 When like a cloud o'er summer-day, 
 
 A group of yearning faces 
 Came, and with tears that spoke their pain, 
 
 To my kind Helen bore me ; 
 Heedless the treasure cancelled then, 
 
 Which time could ne'er restore me. 
 
 She kissed me, and her lipa were cold, 
 Her cheek each moment flushing, 
 
 Like rose leaves on the garden mould, 
 Still in their ruin blushing. 
 
 11 
 
162 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Long wistfully she gazed on me; 
 
 Striving her pain to smother, 
 Then cried, to let her anguish free, 
 
 " My brother, Oh my brother !" 
 
 They laid her 'neath the churchyard stone, 
 
 Among the dew-dipped roses ; 
 That stone is melancholy's throne, 
 
 'Neath which her head reposes. 
 And there I came each summer eve, 
 
 To breathe the prayer she taught me, 
 Kissing the flowers that bid me grieve, 
 
 Methought she there had brought me. 
 
 They say she had her mother's brow, 
 
 Her liquid eye of sadness, 
 Her fading sunset smile, which now 
 
 Is turned to morning gladness. 
 Serene amid my earliest dream, 
 
 I see her witching features ; 
 Oh! saints benignly fair must seem, 
 
 Earth having such soft creatures. 
 
 Her portrait feeds my eager eye, 
 
 By some young limner painted, 
 Who drew from yonder golden sky, 
 
 An inspiration sainted. 
 O blessed be the hand that drew 
 
 That smile, that eye of sorrow, 
 That placid brow of lily hue, 
 
 Where time can plant no furrow. 
 
MY SISTER. 163 
 
 Thou art not dead, my sister sweet, 
 
 I see thee eve and morning, 
 Thy smile of early days I greet, 
 
 The mountain slope adorning. 
 I feel thee in the zephyr's sigh, 
 
 Around me freshly blowing ; 
 I see thy timid twilight eye 
 
 In heaven-streaked sapphire glowing. 
 
 When rancorous spleen and worldly pride, 
 
 Swell darkly in my bosom, 
 I feel thou weepest by my side. 
 
 And when the jasmine blossom 
 Falls on my brow, I know it is 
 
 From thee a gentle token ; 
 Oh ! were it not for thoughts like this, 
 
 Long since my heart were broken. 
 
 Bright is thy bower of loveliness — 
 
 Dark is the gloom before me ; 
 Yet, Oh ! for thee 'tis deeper bliss, 
 
 Here to be watching o'er me. 
 Be thy sweet face the first I meet 
 
 At death's cold gate, when dying, 
 And that dread change for me more sweet, 
 
 On thy kind smile relying ! 
 Taris, 1838. 
 
164 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 TO REVENGE. 
 
 Demon of darkness! Mercy's potent foe! 
 Why dost thou climb to Reason's throne, 
 And snatch the peaceful monarch down, 
 To make Man's breast a weary waste of wo 1 
 Pluck the beacon from the tower, 
 In Shipwreck's melancholy hour, — 
 And let thy dagger, beauty's bosom seek, 
 And wipe it, reeking, on her faded cheek, — 
 Speak of thy rule in antiquated seats, 
 Where shame in war, and vice in peace retreats ; 
 Blacken the earth with sorrow, if thy will, 
 O warrior, boast thee brave, thou art a demon still ! 
 
 Thy finger points to deeds — thou standest still, 
 Like a wild hunter to his fawning brute, 
 With Man, a menial at thy foot, 
 To creep around thy prey, and do thy will : 
 Mark thy servant bending low, 
 Annibal, the Roman foe ! 
 On the cold Alps he blew War's wild alarms, 
 Italia heard the blast, and woke to arms ; 
 But he at Capua, made a truce with war, 
 And left th' espoused escutcheon of thy car — 
 Proud Xerxes failed to pay the debt to Greece, 
 Tho' Jason thou didst help, to steal the golden fleece | 
 
TO REVENGE. 165 
 
 Cannot the tyrant sleep awhile ?— he wakes ! 
 Rouse, then, — ah, rouse th' Eumenides ; 
 Like sheeted goblins, if thou please — 
 At dame Alecto's toilet fix thy snakes : 
 Mount old Ruin's gaunt, pale steed- 
 Fly where men and nations bleed, 
 War with the man who doth thy power hate, 
 Lest ever peace, o'er thee Revenge ! be great — 
 And be thou sated— then thy weapons sheathe, 
 Bind to thy brow Mars' sanguinary wreath- 
 Then may mankind abjure thy awful reign, 
 And once to Peace allied, beneath her sway remain. 
 
 Abington, Pa. 
 
166 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 THE POETRY OF LIFE. 
 
 I. 
 
 The poetry of Life ! — 'tis seen around us — 
 
 Through the whole scenery of our earth so fair- 
 In the good gifts with which our God hath crowned 
 us- 
 Bright skies and clouds— broad seas and sunny 
 air. 
 There's poetry in the distant water — falling 
 
 O'er rocks in forests wild, where mountains rise, 
 And nature with an hundred tongues is calling 
 On us to drink where her pure treasure lies. 
 
 II. 
 
 There's poetry in the aspect of a mountain— 
 
 The many sparkling rills which from it flow — 
 The silvery gushes of a limpid fountain, 
 
 As on it dances to some vale below. 
 There's poetry in a wild and noble river, 
 
 In silence gliding to old ocean's breast — 
 Or when it dashes forth as from a quiver, 
 
 In snowy garb and dazzling silver dressed. 
 
 III. 
 
 There's poetry in an ancient dome — decaying 
 Through many sunshines, and from many storms— 
 
 The twining ivy, round its portals straying 
 In antic festoons, and fantastic forms. 
 
THE POETRY OF LIFE. 167 
 
 There's poetry in a rural cottage dwelling, 
 Afar from marts of strife and busy crowds. 
 
 While all around the choral songs are swelling, 
 Above — the azure sky and fleecy clouds. 
 
 IV. 
 
 There's poetry in the quietude of even, 
 
 As fades the daylight — in the golden West, 
 And when the stars shine forth from distant heaven , 
 
 Like brilliant diamonds in an azure crest. 
 'Tis the rapt time when praise ascendeth 
 
 From the full soul like incense — in the air — 
 When day'its splendor^with the evening blendeth 
 
 And tuneful hearts blend poetry with prayer. 
 
 Auburn, Nov. 1839. S. S. Y. 
 
168 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 On Nilus' banks, behold a gathered crowd ! 
 Where Egypt's sons and Egypt's lovely daughters, 
 Gaze in inute awe, above the rushing waters. 
 
 The morn is sweet— the sky without a cloud ; 
 
 That throng is hushed— the gay, the poor, the proud; 
 And all upon the glowing Orient gaze, — 
 For when the sun darts forth his earliest rays, 
 
 Great Memnon's summit lifts its voice aloud, 
 With music ravishing. From God's own hand, 
 
 There is a temple,— 'tis the human soul ; 
 
 And when at pitying Mercy's sweet demand, 
 The Son of Righteousness doth on it shine, 
 'Tis filled, subdued, with harmony divine — 
 
 As if heaven's music through its members stole. 
 
169 
 
 SONG. 
 
 BY M. A. DODD. 
 
 Mart, the summer hours are swiftly flying, 
 And my light bark is out upon the sea ; 
 
 From the blue West the sunset's light is dying, 
 As sad I turn to bid farewell to thee. 
 
 Soon shall I be in other lands a rover : 
 
 Lady ! my short, bright dream of love is over. 
 
 Hope pointed to a brilliant star before me, 
 Love filled my heart with a wild burning dream, 
 
 And Poesy had wove her bright spell o'er me — 
 Thou ! wert the star, the vision, and the theme. 
 
 Soon shall I be 'neath other skies a rover : 
 
 Lady ! my short, sweet dream of love is over. 
 
 The harp is mute which woke to thee its numbers, 
 And hope's delusive star has darkly set ; 
 
 Within my soul the tide of passion slumbers ; 
 My task is now to wander and forget. 
 
 Soon shall I be in other lands a rover : 
 
 Lady ! my brief, bright dream of love is over. 
 
 12 
 
170 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 THE DESERTED BURIAL GROUND. 
 
 BT REV. JOHN WILLIAMS. 
 
 September's sunset ! down yon quiet lane, 
 
 Where waves on either hand the ripening grain, 
 
 Walk, as with pace adapted to the hour, 
 
 Toward yon old gate 'neath vine-enwreathed bower. 
 
 A holy stillness dwells the place around — 
 
 A solemn spot — an ancient burial ground. 
 
 Here on some time-worn tablet may we rest, 
 
 While glows with parting day, the golden west : 
 
 Gaze on green field, with many a graceful tree, 
 
 Whence pour gay birds their evening symphony ; 
 
 On mountain where the softened sunlight sleeps, 
 
 With rosy robe invests its shaggy steeps ; 
 
 Lights here a lofty peak, there lost in shade, 
 
 Tells of the deep cool dell, or breezy glade : 
 
 On sheltered hamlet bid our sight repose, 
 
 Whence comes the evening hum of labor's close : 
 
 Or turning where around us frequent rise 
 
 Old stones with carving rude, and quaint device, 
 
 Muse as in dreamy state reclined we lie, 
 
 These records of antique simplicity ; 
 
 While to the current of our thoughts, meantime, 
 
 Yon river murmurs in accordant chime. 
 
 No fresh piled mound here tells the saddening tale 
 
 Of spirit's parting pang, and mourners's wail ! 
 
THE DESERTED BURIAL GROUND. 171 
 
 No tall rank grass here pictures to the eye, 
 The festering remnants of mortality. 
 The wild flower rising gracefully and light. 
 Bending on stem so wavy and so light, 
 Drinks but the purest dews of bright-eyed even, 
 And owes its fragrance to the breath of heaven. 
 Thus 'mid half felt realities we gain 
 The church-yard's moral, while we miss its pain. 
 Here side by side old warrior forms repose ; 
 And the same clod perchance may now enclose 
 Their crumbled bodies, who in life had said, 
 The white man ne'er could mingle with the red !* 
 How solemnly it tells — this mouldered clay — 
 The littleness of man, and man's brief day ; 
 While mortal forms that erst in furious fight, 
 Strove for some fancied or some ill-gained right ; 
 Hearts that with deep and deadly hatred burned, 
 Nor e'er to pity's kindly accents turned, 
 Decayed and mouldered 'neath the self-same sod, 
 Now closely mingling form one common clod ! 
 Oh may not thus the souls of every kin, 
 That ever shall be, or that e'er hath been, 
 Joined in one love, one only Lord adore, 
 And all be peace where all was hate before ? 
 Such shall be when earth's films are purged away, 
 And man hath wakened in eternal day ! 
 
 * The Burial Ground, which suggested the thoughts contained 
 1 these lines, had been used for purposes of interment by both 
 /hites and Indians. 
 
172 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 But now from cottage chimneys smoke curls forth, 
 Where gather household groups, round home's dear 
 
 hearth ; 
 Now on the hill tops deeper shades descend, 
 And tree, town, field in misty dimness blend ; 
 Leave we the sleepers to the length of night, 
 Broke but by sound of stream, or owlet's flight. 
 
A LETTER FROM THE OLD DOMINION. 173 
 
 A LETTER FROM THE OLD DOMINION. 
 
 BY A VKRMOKTER. 
 
 To Miss C. G. C. 
 
 Dear Cate, a year has flitted by 
 
 Since that half sad, half merry night— 
 Our last at home — when every eye 
 
 Betwixt a tear and smile was bright ! 
 When thou with bounding heart wert going 
 
 From those whose love no words could tell, 
 And they with saddened looks bestowing 
 
 The oft-repeated warm farewell ! 
 If then, when many voices blessed thee, 
 And lips more privileged caressed thee, 
 In sadness and in silence there, 
 I took no kiss, and spoke no prayer ; 
 Yet, midst that kindred company, 
 None loved thee more unfeignedly ! 
 Nay ! do not frown: for He doth know, 
 Who formed the heart, that not the snow 
 Which on the north wind's pinion flies, 
 Or on the mountain's summit lies, 
 Is from ail earthly stain more free 
 Than my affection, Cate, for thee ! 
 
 I loved you as a merry child, 
 A pretty and mischievous one, 
 
174 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 With eye as bright and step as wild 
 
 As age e'er loved to look upon ! 
 And when a few brief seasons o'er, 
 
 That step and eye grew more sedate, 
 I had, though you loved others more, 
 
 A brother's kindness for thee, Cate ! 
 
 Since that sweet night, around thy heart 
 
 New friends their wreaths of love have twined, 
 And colder, now, they say thou art, 
 
 To those to whom you then were kind. 
 Somewhat, perchance, I might complain 
 (But that I knew complaint were vain) 
 Of promised letter, long forgot, 
 And kindly message answered not; 
 But let them pass : it is not strange, 
 When all are changing, thou shouldst change, 
 And little claim have 1 to be 
 More than each common friend to thee ; 
 I only ask for that which all 
 
 You long have known, alike may share, 
 When pensive hours their names recall, 
 
 That I be unforgotten there ; 
 That none but pleasant thoughts may be 
 Twined with thy memory of me ! 
 
 I write thee from a " land where deeds 
 
 Of glory anciently were done," 
 Whose history, childhood earliest reads, 
 
 And young hearts thrill to think upon. 
 Since last I met thee, I have gazed 
 
 Upon the place where Jamestown stood ; 
 
A LETTER FROM THE OLD DOMINION. 175 
 
 The church which first the settlers raised, 
 
 Peering above the underwood, 
 Is all that's left to mark the spot 
 Where first the white man reared his cot ! 
 'Twas here that Smith's bold cheek grew wan 
 Beneath the arm of Powhatan, 
 Which, lifted high, wasjust descending, 
 
 When she— the noble and the young- 
 While all around dark brows were bending — 
 
 To save the pale-faced stranger, sprung ! 
 And history's muse, and poet's lyre, 
 Still with undying zeal conspire 
 To bind a wreath of purest fame 
 About that Indian maiden's name ; 
 And not the proudest queen in story 
 Can vie with Pochahontas' glory ! 
 I've seen the ruined walls, from whence 
 
 The voice of Patrick Henry, heard 
 In strains of thrilling eloquence, 
 
 A nation's slumbering passion stirred ! 
 Cornwallis' cave I've stood within, 
 And trod the field he could not win, 
 Where freedom's right and freedom's might, 
 Triumphant met on Yorktown's height! 
 
 I write thee from a land where spring 
 
 In place of dreary winter, reigns, 
 Where flowers scarce cease from blossoming, 
 
 And soft winds blow o'er verdant plains. 
 Yet here— where noble deeds were done, 
 Yet here— beneath a warmer sun, 
 I proudly name my place of birth, 
 The best, the happiest land on earth ! 
 
176 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 What tho' the wintry tempest's shock, 
 
 The pines upon our mountains rock ; 
 
 What tho' the flowers for months are bowed 
 
 Beneath the snow's wide spreading shroud ; 
 
 Tho' drear the night wind's whistlings be, 
 
 Which round our eaves sound mournfully ; 
 
 Yet bright fires there are blazing high, 
 
 And laughing circles crowding nigh, 
 
 And merry maidens join in song, 
 
 Or grandams tell their stories long, 
 
 Or beaux, who with the parties mix, 
 
 Talk to papas of politics, 
 
 And with many a word and smile, 
 
 Steal bright-eyed daughters hearts the while ; 
 
 Perhaps, averse to ruder play, 
 
 The sober student brings his book, 
 And hopes in this more gentle way, 
 
 To win some fair one's favoring look ; 
 For whither shall we seek to find 
 The lads more true — the maids more kind ! 
 And thus, around the cheerful hearth, 
 With conversation, books, and mirth, 
 Or else abroad — away ! away ! 
 In the exhilarating sleigh; 
 With hearts forever warm and light, 
 We hasten winter's tardy flight ! 
 And when the spring has brought its flowers, 
 What land, in beauty, equals ours 1 
 
 But better— better far — its sod 
 None but the free have ever trod ! 
 
A LETTER FROM THE OLD DOMINION. 177 
 
 No tyrant-liberty there waves 
 A spangled banner over slaves ! 
 For this I love Vermont, altho' 
 
 Cold are her storms and late her spring, 
 And wheresoe'er my footsteps go, 
 
 My heart can know no wandering. 
 Each hour of thought brings fresh to mind 
 The smiles of those I left behind ; 
 And many an unforgotten word, 
 
 In kindness spoken long ago, 
 And tones of silvery laughter heard 
 
 In happy hours ; and soft and low 
 The solemn tone of evening prayer 
 I used to hear, when with you there ! 
 
 Now Cate, adieu ! may hope and love 
 
 For you their fairest garlands twine, 
 Life's sky be ever bright above, 
 
 Or through its clouds may rainbows shine ! 
 And ever thine that calmer joy — 
 
 That peace, from Heaven alone descending ; 
 That hope, naught earthly can destroy ; 
 
 That love, eternally unending ! 
 Oh serve thy God ! and when the wing 
 
 Of gladness speeds thee joyously, 
 And in the hour of suffering, 
 
 He will thy guide and comfort be ! 
 And at that consecrated time, 
 
 When happy thoughts to Heaven you raise, 
 Oh pray for him who wreathes this rhyme — 
 
 The playmate of your girlhood's days ! 
 
178 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Tho' weak and erring— passion tossed, 
 
 His hopes by sin's dark cloud o'ercast, 
 He yet, when life's rough sea is crossed, 
 May rest with thee in heaven at last! 
 
 Belle-farm, Gloucester Co., Virginia. 
 
THE CURFEW BELL. 179 
 
 THE CURFEW BELL. 
 
 BY WILLIAM FALCONER. 
 
 When 'neath the folding-star the curfew bell 
 Tolls, and dim shadows nestle in the dell ; 
 When friends are few, and even the few are cold, 
 I think on days of old ! 
 
 From hoary Druid oaks the clear tones come, 
 And melt away through evening's cloud-piled dome ; 
 Summon they back thejoyous spirits bold 
 
 They called from sport of old 1 
 
 Spirit of her I loved in youth so well, 
 Surely you hear with me that gentle bell, 
 Though twenty years above your clay have rolled- 
 Sylph of the days of old ! 
 
 •Sweet curfew bell— thy tolling seems to me 
 The falling murmur of youth's summer sea, 
 IVben gay our barques went through its liquid gold, 
 In the fair days of old ! 
 
 When pulses deep that struggle in my breast, 
 5o feverish now, have worn themselves to rest— 
 
180 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Toll a low requiem o'er my humble mould, 
 Voice of the days of old ! 
 
 For none will mourn when slowly I depart — 
 My memory glows but in one friendly heart, 
 And he is far— his eyes strange stars behold- 
 Far as the days of old! 
 Paris, 1828. 
 
SOMKTHING ABOUT FLOWERS. 181 
 
 SOMETHING ABOUT FLOWERS. 
 
 BY RICHARD BACON, JR. 
 
 The author of Pelham, whose writings are enriched 
 with aphorisms of a mind keen in observation of 
 character, has somewhere said, that " where you see 
 a flower in a cottage garden, you may be sure that 
 the cottagers are wiser and better than their neigh- 
 bors." I at first gave the saying a place in the 
 scrap-book of memory, among shreds of fancy, and 
 odd ends of poetry, but, having seen more of the 
 world, I have since set it down upon a page of indis- 
 putable maxims. Yes, Mr. Bulwer is right. And 
 now, if I be whirling in a stage-coach, I cannot pass 
 a flower-garden before the humblest cottage, with- 
 out striving to catch a glimpse of the tenants : for 
 with tulips, roses and geraniums, which breathe 
 their fragrance for the poor man, I have learned to 
 associate in my mind well bred children, with clean 
 and gladsome face ; and elder sisters with neat ker- 
 chief, smiling lips, and ringlets a la belle. 
 
 With the man of wealth— I mean in the country— 
 a flower-garden is almost a thing of course ; it is 
 regarded as fashionable, and on his part it costs little 
 or no sacrifice of ease to keep up, in this respect, with 
 the style of his patrician neighbors. Hence, flow- 
 ers before the mansion reared by affluence, give 
 little or no indication of taste or character. But 
 with him who has a cottage for a dwelling, it is dif- 
 ferent. Perhaps the comforts of life for himself and 
 
182 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 family, are attained only at the price of daily labor ; 
 and if a vine clamber upon his thatch, or a flower 
 throws its blushes beneath his window, it indicates 
 an innate love for the beautiful in nature, which 
 prompts him to spend the little leisure that life's 
 stern duties afford — and which, perhaps, his neigh- 
 bor squanders at the haunts of inebriety— in beauti- 
 fying his dwelling— the home of those with whom 
 he exchanges love, yes, and I know that the jasmine, 
 which he has planted, is watered and woven upon 
 the trellis by her who shares his cares and pleas- 
 ures ; and that the corner of the garden, pranked all 
 over with pinks and violets, the little ones proudly 
 call their own ; for it has been set apart to keep 
 them from evil playmates, and to excite to industry. 
 I say, those who make such employments their 
 pastime, possess a spiritual love of the beautiful ; 
 and you may be sure, that the same taste which 
 prompts them to teach the woodbine to climb, and 
 the rose to bud, will also lead them to cultivate the 
 minds of themselves and children, and to educate 
 those affections of the heart, which soften the ilia 
 of life, and make the fire-side happy. Is it not, 
 then, truly said, that such a family are wiser and 
 better than their neighbors ? 
 
 " She sketched from nature well, and studied flowers, 
 Which was enough, alone, to love her for." 
 
 An author, whose name I have forgotten, lends 
 me this sentiment: "Never give your affections to 
 a girl, who cherishes no love for flowers." Philoso- 
 phy has not prompted a better maxim. Innocence 
 
SOMETHING ABOUT FLOWERS. 183 
 
 and purity have ever been typified by flowers, and 
 does not the love of an attribute lead to a fondness 
 for its emblem 1 But is there not in the unsophisti- 
 cated heart, an inherent love for those beautiful 
 children of the sunshine 1 Else to what end are 
 they strown along our pathway ? Wherefore are 
 they made— for they add not to man's physical com- 
 
 . fort— if there is nothing in the spiritual nature to 
 which they minister ? There is such a principle — 
 the flowers are not made in vain. What do the 
 
 ' dingy geraniums, so fondly nursed in the smoky city, 
 
 ' denote, but this same love of flowers, and a pining 
 
 ■ for their companionship 7 
 
 / Yes, the spirit has a chord, which, if strung 
 aright, vibrates sweetest music when stirred by the 
 breathings of nature's beauty ; and I am willing to 
 believe, that the same sympathy of feeling, which 
 links in fellowship hearts of a kindred purity, ex- 
 tends to things inanimate, as well as to spirits of 
 
 ( happiness, and bands loveliness into one great sister- 
 
 'hood. 
 
 A poet has a thought which falls in with this 
 notion : 
 
 "And all earth's (lowers, so fair and sweet, 
 
 Would flourish but awhile, 
 If in return they could not meet 
 
 The light of woman's smile." 
 
 It is a German fancy that the angels love the 
 flowers, and when upon the earth nfake them their 
 abiding place. )•. 
 
 " Abroad must thou go, on thy white bosom wear 
 A nostgay, and doubt noi an angel is there ; 
 
184 THE MOSS-ROSE. 
 
 Place a rose near thy bed nightly sentry to keep, 
 And angels shall rock thee on roses to sleep." 
 
 " Alas they all are in their graves ; the gentle race of flowers! 
 Are sleeping in their lowly beds with the good and fair of ours. 
 
 Bryant. 
 
 How solemnly does every thing around remind i 
 man of his fallen estate ! The sentence of death 
 hath passed upon all things ; and the flower with- 
 ers in the midst of beauty. Well, there is a better 
 land, where the spirit of loveliness shall dwell for- 
 ever ; where fragrance shall ascend as incense, 
 from flowers which can never fade ! 
 
 C 32 89 
 
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